


The Fear of Promise

by Like_a_Hurricane



Series: Dare to Believe in Us [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cancer-verse, F/F, F/M, I swear this story was an accident but it was too pretty for me to stop it, Loki is a BAMF, M/M, Multi, Multiverses, Pepper Potts is a BAMF, The Thanos Imperative, Thor 2 compatible, Tony Stark is a BAMF, borrowing heavily from 616 and warping it severely, more of that world-building I do with Nifelheim and Jotunnheim because reasons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-09
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2018-01-11 16:50:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 65,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1175477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Like_a_Hurricane/pseuds/Like_a_Hurricane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a version of Loki who has visited over one hundred universes not his own. He seeks out those he has lost, with the intent to save them where he failed, in the universe that was once his home. He knew all along it would end, one day. The jumps weren't getting any easier. He was only getting sicker and sicker from the virus eating away at himself and his magics.</p><p>His last jump, he lands too early for his lovers to be anything less than stunned that he would go to them, of all people. He is not, however, too late to save them. He makes do.</p><p>Tony Stark and Pepper Potts get the shock of their lives, and so does Loki when he hears what this older, dying version of himself tells all three of them the most startling and unbelievable thing possible: the truth, and an lot of it. The very worst thing they can do, all of them know, is to get their hopes up: hopes shatter, and hopes hurt.</p><p>That doesn't stop them wondering, and wanting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this on accident, and it exploded beyond my control. I've split it into two parts, because I'm still proofreading the second one. I swear this came to me in a dream and demanded to be written. Proofreading it slowly has been one of few tasks I'm capable of through the haze of allergies and this lovely viral infection I've got, and the cold meds that helped me cope with both, over the past week or so.
> 
> Once I'm recovered, it'll be back onto _Catch and Release_ , but here's some Peppered Frostiron for the time being.

This couldn’t be the last. He had still arrived too late.

“You really think you’ll last another jump?” Tony asked.

The trickster didn’t even have to remind himself any longer that this wasn’t _his_ Tony. This wasn’t his universe. It was more obvious than ever with this universe’s version of himself standing with his back toward the med-lab tables, shoulders hunched against the pain of grief and loss and anger, where he leaned against the door-frame.

_Still too late. Still too late._

“I have to,” the older Loki said. He was more scarred than his counterpart, more gaunt, his skin almost transparent. His veins looked grey with the sickness still pumping through his system. It was contained, in him, and no longer a threat to any other magic users so long as they did not open up to him, to share power or spell-cast alongside him. What magic he had left now was scarcely enough to propel him through the void one more time. “I can’t let this be the last. Not when I’ve failed four times now.”

“You couldn’t have known these mechanisms were breaking down,” Tony said, where he worked on the device strapped across Loki’s body like a bandolier. He hadn’t commented on the god’s relative lack of armor, save the vambraces on his arms. This older version of Loki wore only a dark green traveling cloak stained darker still here and there by streaks of oil and smoke and blood, a green tunic and black leather waistcoat, soft black leather pants with only a few metallic accents down the sides, and his usual heavy boots. The mechanical device, arc reactor incorporated into it, had a few components that made the inventor’s blood run cold where they pierced Loki’s clothing and sunk strange roots under skin and muscle and, in one or two places, bone. He had seen his own universe’s Loki merge Iron Man tech and his own magics, but never like that. The components still outside the trickster’s body had begun to lose precision, in a few places; the stubborn god had kept jumping between universes past the point he or the machines enabling him should have been able to support.

“I should have known,” Loki murmured. “I _built_ them.”

“When you showed up here, your arrival speech was interrupted by you coughing up half a lung’s worth of your own blood,” Tony reminded. “You also wouldn’t stop slipping into Farsi, of all languages, until we managed to convince you that no, really, you _did_ have a severe concussion.”

“Reasons I’m grateful Dr. Banner survived in this universe, yes. Thank him again for me. I would not be fit for another attempt without his aid.”

“My point is, Loki, that you’re not in top shape. I don’t know how you’re still doing this. How many...” He hesitated, swallowing tightly. “How many jumps have you done?”

“One-hundred and seventy-three,” the trickster said, aware of his counterpart in the doorway listening in suddenly.

“How many did we not need saving?”

“Eight.”

Tony nodded thoughtfully. “How many successful?”

“One-hundred and forty-six,” Loki recounted. “Early attempts, I was still trying to perfect the mechanism you’re currently adjusting. I arrived too late the first time, and it nearly killed me. In the next attempt, I protected most of you, but in doing so, lost _her_ again, just differently than the last time. The time after that, I lost you the same way.” He swallowed thickly. “After that, I involved my selves in those universes far more, and was successful, until the tenth jump. You lost me, and I was not alone.” He winced at the memory. “In the three jumps after that... there was something different about the enemy, every time, just too different for me to predict, for my aid to be enough. It took me time to realize the Avatar of Life had begun to realize what I was doing. He was following my jumps, somehow. It took me half a dozen attempts to shake him loose from my trail, and every one of those jumps lost someone, or even all of you a few times.” He hissed as a component Tony was adjusting overheated a bit, too close to the skin. The inventor tried to apologize, but Loki only shook his head. “I still stopped the Cancer-verse each jump, in the hopes it would make me more difficult to follow, but in the end on that sixth attempt I had to sacrifice an entire timeline to the unknown, killing Mar-Vell myself when he was younger, before he could bring the Cancer-verse.”

“Why didn’t you do that from the first?” Tony asked softly.

“It cost me too much to go back so far, and the temporal distortion it caused, the changes in the time-stream, caused the next jump to almost kill me. I also know nothing of how that universe’s future truly panned out, in the end. I never saw myself in it at all, nor you.”

“But of course you still tried to aim for Mar-Vell again in the next one, too.”

“It should have prevented all of it,” Loki whispered.

“Did it? Because it sounds like when you did make it to the next one, something confirmed that wasn’t enough,” Tony said softly, glancing up from the complex mechanism he was ever-so-gently repairing.

The trickster exhaled heavily through his nose. “The Avatar changed, and came earlier. The Cancer-verse adapted, instantly. I had to work to undo that, lest all be lost far sooner. We almost never-” He hesitated. “It... wasn’t worth it. Not to be unable to even see myself as happy as I once was, for never having known you all? I could not ally with myself as I was, then; not and ally with the Avengers, too, and I did need their aid. I almost lost even the _chance_ to have known you. I had to trick the Cancer-verse into returning to its prior state, at the cost of a two more failed jumps, after that. Then, finally, more successes followed for a long time.” He watched this universe’s version of himself step away into the hall, leaving them, possibly unable to stand listening further.

“And then the last four...”

“This one included.”

“You saved us, Loki. I still count this as a win.”

“ _I_ don’t,” Loki said, glancing pointedly toward the door. “And I don’t blame him.”

Tony looked over his shoulder, sighing to see his own trickster gone. “He’s just...”

“He knows what my timing cost us.”

“Loki...”

The god shut his eyes, more tired now than he had ever felt before. “Is it really enough, for you? Having still lost... all of them?” His eyes unclosed and searched the inventor’s desperately.

“It’s not about ‘enough’. It’s about still not being alone. Still not _mourning_ them alone,” Tony said, low and calm. “We lost them long before you showed up. If I’d lost him today, or if he’d lost me... I know I’d never recover, and based on the evidence right in front of me here, neither would you, even if the rest of the universe was saved.”

Loki swallowed tightly. “Mine was lost, I told you that. I was barely able to escape before Death herself died and I became a part of the cancer.”

“And you escaped even though it was pointless, for you.” Tony shook his head. “You’re dying. You’ve been dying since before you left, and instead of accepting horrible immortality, or laying down and dying, you’re still going, for us. All of us.” He tugged at the thin titanium-alloy chain at the back of Loki’s neck. He knew it connected to a locket, under the god’s clothes. He had seen the images held in it; they were the same ones his own trickster carried, though not in the same carrying-case, as it were. “If I hadn’t...” Tony glanced back over his shoulder, toward the door, which this universe’s Loki was now pushing open again. “You’re better than you know,” Tony concluded.

The older trickster smiled a thin, crooked smile that barely reached his eyes. It tugged at the four long parallel scars that ran down his right cheek, and throat, only crooked a little where the claws that’d inflicted them had caught on his jaw-bone. It was the main difference in his appearance, aside from deeper lines at the corners of his eyes and the grey-black of his veins visible through his too-thin skin, which differentiated him from the Loki of this universe. Both of them had another, smaller scar, bisecting their left eyebrows and running halfway up their foreheads.

The younger, more natural of the pair of tricksters tossed a small object to the elder, who caught it in one hand, then hissed in pain even as his grip tightened around the small, glowing projectile.

“You’ll need a little more magic to be of any use,” this universe’s Loki said. “I managed to come up with a self-contained means to loan you a little, but it will burn.”

The sphere the other had caught began to shrink, slowly being absorbed into his system. The illness eating away at him from would consume half of it within hours, but the remainder––the remainder was enough to help. “Thank you.”

“You have my thanks as well,” the younger said, with cool sincerity.

The pair held one another’s gaze for a few seconds, until Tony closed the compartments of the bandolier-like adornment the visiting Loki wore. “You should be good to go, with a bit of rest.”

“If I sleep now, I will not wake.”

“That bad?” Tony asked quietly.

The god nodded. “You set it to aim for an earlier time?”

“Yeah, but... the damage was really bad. It might be, uh, a bit earlier than I think? There’s a high risk of that. I can’t do anything further without rebuilding half of it from the ground up, and you don’t have that time.”

Loki inhaled sharply, but nodded. “Indeed I do not. Forewarning them of what is to come should still help, considerably. I just... won’t be able to fight with us this time.” He sounded both fearful and relieved.

“Of the eight you did not need to save... were any of them in their future?” the younger god asked.

“One was. I hit upon an unexpected time distortion, which knocked me askew, but also was part of a measure in place that made that universe unsuitable for the Cancer-verse. Thanos had seen the Cancer-verse while he wielded the Infinity Gauntlet, in that universe, and foresaw the death of his love. He told the Magus of it, and when the gauntlet changed hands, protections were put in place.” The older trickster dug in one pocket. He pulled out a small memory stick and proffered it to them both. “I will not need this, where I am going. If it may comfort you as it has me, in dark times, then you both should have it. It’s... it’s their farewell to me, after I told them what I have been doing, and all I’ve lost.”

The younger Loki reached out with a shaking hand, and took hold of it. “Thank you,” he rasped, his voice unsteady. He rested both hands on Tony’s shoulders, as they stepped back to provide room for the traveler to regain his feet.

Unsteadily, the more scarred trickster did so, only the bolster of borrowed magic and strength really keeping him upright, though he would never admit as much. He was already losing some of his peripheral vision. Time was short.

One more try. _Once more into the breach_.

“You’re sure you’re ready?” Tony asked.

“I have prepared for so many alternatives...” The dying trickster shook his head, smiling sadly. “Even if I land well earlier than planned, all will be far from lost. I’m very certain of that.”

They nodded at him, grimly understanding and perhaps a little fearful.

He did not say goodbye. He did not thank them again. He could see in both men’s faces that they knew. They understood.

So Loki-the-traveler reached down to the device on his chest and sent a pulse of power across the altered arc-reactor. As it caught and built within the device, he felt the sudden surge of energy through his entire body, sending the disease creeping through his veins into temporary shock as the world dropped away, then the whole of that particular universe dropped away. Time skittered sideways drunkenly and then seemingly up, and then it was all twisting and falling in a strange way that only ever made sense passing between fourth and fifth dimensions like this. It was clumsy, but powerful, as it always felt, every time, crashing through universes until he hit one similar enough to his native one to allow the complex spells woven around and through his blood and the machine carved into him to grip it, recognize it as a place he once considered home, and begin to target the right time and world and place to land on.

It felt like years passed, in the dark, as those calculations ran and the trickster was left trying to ignore the sensation of being unfathomably small, smaller than a single atom. He waited in the dark between, so much quieter than other voids he had fallen through, and drifted like a leaf on the wind.

It was no small feat, jumping to a particular time and place in a whole other universe, but Loki was never less than awe-inspiring when he truly needed to be, or when those he loved well and truly needed him to be.

He had never been needed more direly by those people than he had after losing his own universe, even if none of them were truly his any longer.

It was still as self-serving as it was still possible for him to be.

Loki Lie-smith, god of chaos, lies, and mischief, he still was.

And wherever he still was, there was a chance for him to have something unique and wonderful, and a further chance, with some interference, that it wouldn’t all be taken away violently and horribly in a premature apocalypse caused by a cancerous neighboring universe.

It filled him with fear, thinking he wouldn’t be able to help them fight this time.

He would give them everything he could, then, before the end.

No lies, no games. He would owe them that.

He waited a long time in the dark, outside of time, unable to grow sicker or less sick, unchanging, as he drifted to where he was next needed and tried not to dream.

 

~~

 

Landing was never pretty.

This was certainly no exception, but at least there were no witnesses to the sudden formation of a crater in this particular New York alleyway, and the old instant-concealment parts of the magic-based landing-gear still kicked in the second Loki’s existence in this universe was imminent, so that even if there had been witnesses watching, even inanimate or mystically enhanced ones, nothing would have appeared abnormal to them.

Pushing himself up onto his elbows, the trickster groaned.

The time spent between universes had one benefit, to his condition. His sickness was temporarily suspended in its progression, for a few hours after each landing. This meant, for a short time, he could use his remaining magic without agonizing pain.

That suspension-time, however, had grown shorter with each jump.

Originally it had lasted just over a day. By now, he was lucky to have an hour.

How time flies.

The trickster pulled himself to his feet and dusted himself off. He summoned the illusion of a finely tailored suit and less diseased complexion, and fixed his hair into a smooth ponytail with a simple spell. Dropping all but the more mystically-inclined and facial-recognition-deflecting wards for the time being, he stepped out into the street and found himself perhaps a block from Avengers tower. The sight of it made him swallow convulsively. It looked... off, somehow.

It was only as he began to walk toward it, taking in the city and picking up a newspaper off of a cafe table where a diner had left it, that he realized why.

Early. He was far, far too early to last until the war.

His fingers went to the chain about his neck and he weighed his options, feeling his resolution to be sincere become suddenly more tentative. There was changing the past and there was... this.

“You don’t even know me yet,” he murmured.

 _Well, they do_ , he thought. _They know you from the Chitauri invasion, and Thor has informed S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers both that you died honorably in Svartalfheim, saving his life_. The trickster found a quiet alley between a cafe and a boutique, and leaned against one brick wall, almost laughing himself sick.

This wouldn’t be the first time he had made a few alterations to the time-stream and the past of some other version of himself, but this would be the first time he would rob them of their narrative. Before, when he had been too early, it had been before Svartalfheim. He had been able to visit himself in prison and make attempts to bring himself to his senses, or made a few deals, but after that, and after he had put enough machinations in place far from earth and Asgard, to make certain that the Cancer-verse would be prevented, he had left himself with only a few hints as to the importance of certain mortals. The rest of the tale had gone, he had to assume, otherwise as it had for himself.

That couldn’t be the case, here.

Perhaps it was morbid, or a bit broken of him, but the trickster was looking forward slightly to seeing the look on his own face. _At least,_ he mused _, likelihood is he won’t be wearing our face most of the conversation, until I get him to drop the guise._

He was far from Asgard now, however, and needed to get there. Thus, he needed people willing to listen to him, rather than shoot on sight, and who would know the weight of his words when he made promises. That meant Tony Stark was still his safest bet, and most preferred, particularly with Pepper nearby to anchor him, if possible.

Near the foot of Avengers tower, Loki cast a brief spell to conceal himself from all security technologies and people both, before quite stepping into the range of JARVIS’s awareness. He still had to be sparing with his power, so getting directly underneath the places overhead that he wanted to teleport to would be of considerable aid: fewer factors to struggle with. He made the attempt.

It only partially worked, and he was left gasping and almost falling to the floor in Tony’s private lab, barely catching himself on a work-table as he waited for vertigo to pass and quietly hacked one of the nearest displays, cutting off all of the silent alarms his sudden arrival had set off.

He coughed behind one hand, and tasted blood.

_Too soon. Too soon._

 

~~

 

Pepper examined the delivery system carefully. It was just like the applicator that had pushed Extremis into her system in the first place, but a little shinier and more efficient. “This will hurt, won’t it?” she asked.

Tony nodded. “It will. A lot. I can’t stop that.”

“If I...” She hesitated. “This version of it, isn’t stable.” She shot him a look. “Could you change that, with a bit of work, maybe?”

He held her gaze steadily. “I could. I can tell you it’s a bit of a relief, you being more indestructible for a while, but not when the possible side-effects still include ‘high risk of spontaneous combustion.’”

Pepper laughed a little. “Yeah... I think I’d feel about the same if you had it.”

“I did think about it.”

They looked at each other for a long few moments, and then Pepper handed him the anti-serum, and pulled up her sleeve to expose the underside of her forearm.

“You sure you’re ready?” Tony asked.

“No,” she said. “But you should do it anyway.”

“Sorry to interrupt,” JARVIS cut in, “but there was just a momentary security breach in your private laboratory, Tony.”

The inventor stilled. “What do you mean ‘momentary’?”

“Alarms indicated a sudden energy surge, but then all evidence of it, save my own memory, abruptly vanished from the grid within thirty seconds. All codes used for alterations are... your own personal ones. Given you are here, and not in the lab, I found that a notable discrepancy.”

“No shit.” Tony set the syringe aside, and started to stand up.

Just then, a few feet in front of them, Loki appeared, both hands raised with palms forward in a gesture of harmlessness.

Tony almost jumped back a step, then merely stood still in awe as Pepper put herself between them, hands and eyes ablaze and some of her veins glowing visibly under her skin.

Loki, who looked worse for wear already just based on all the new scars, had initially worn a somber and calmly reassuring sort of expression, but at the sight of Pepper his expression became one first of shock, then something disconcertingly like heartbreak. Then unexpectedly, he laughed a little bit hysterically.

“Okay, the amount of crazy you’re displaying so far is pretty convincing, but last we heard, the last person I saw with your face was supposedly dead,” Tony said quickly. “Then again, it was Thor reporting his brother’s honorable death saving his life, so if you faked that, I wouldn’t be surprised. What the fuck are you doing here?”

“I swear to you on my very soul that I mean no harm to either of you, or anyone in this tower,” Loki said, wiping at one eye. He said it like it had become routine for him, which threw the inventor for a loop more than almost anything else. “I’m not actually the Loki you know. I’m from... well, alternate future timeline, alternate universe: they’re more similar than you might think, actually.”

“You’re saying you come in peace... from the future?” Pepper asked.

“Yes, sorry. I just realized that this time around, this is the first time you’ve met me in person. Well, not me, but me here.” He waved a hand vaguely. “Well, I say ‘here’ but in fact, I’m probably still up to something in Asgard rather than here on Earth; otherwise I could have started with myself rather than further muddling events in this manner.” He sounded very tired. “Pardon me, please. It’s been a very trying jump. I’m not from this universe; I might have mentioned.”

“Mr. Lie-smith, you are concealed behind at least two spells which obscure your  current physical appearance, including one for your clothing and something else closer to the surface of your skin,” JARVIS chimed in. “It will be easier for all concerned to trust your intentions if you do not falsify your looks.”

“He has a point,” Tony concurred.

Loki sighed. “I really do mean you no harm.” He smiled sadly. “That said, let me further show you that even if I did, I lack the strength to carry out any such ill-intended acts as you might rightfully suspect me of.” He lowered the images of immaculate suit and healthy complexion, and watched their eyes widen. “I’m dying. There is no means for it to stop, but it will end with me, unless any other magic users are foolish enough to donate power to me. It feeds on magic foremost, and beyond that it consumes all within me that usually channels or produces energy and magic. I do not have very much time left. I swear to that, too. It is the truth.”

“You’re giving your supposedly-unbreakable word awfully easy,” the inventor said, still suspicious.

“It saves on time.” He swayed slightly on his feet, his eyes glazing over slightly. “Ah. Damn.” Then his legs gave out and he barely managed to catch himself enough to land with his knees folded under him and his arms holding the rest of him up.

Pepper stepped closer, cautiously, despite Tony trying to quietly deter her by tugging at the back of her shirt. She knelt in front of the trickster, her skin still aglow, and he looked up at her with an expression that made her breath catch. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Loki shook his head slowly, never taking his eyes off of hers. “It’s been far too long since I’ve seen you well,” he whispered, reaching out to touch her face. She almost pulled back, worried he would get burnt, but watched his hand change from pale grey to blue and stilled, curious. His touch on her cheek felt blissfully cold, soothing in a strange and improbable way. She sighed a little into it.

“This is still the first time you’ve had Extremis?” Loki asked, barely a whisper.

Her eyes narrowed a bit, but she nodded. “Yes. I... do this again?”

“It was an emergency, of sorts. You kept it long after that, however. That was in another universe, long ago for me,” the trickster said, aware of Tony stepping closer to them, now able to hear their words again, low voices or no.

“It was stable?” Tony asked.

Loki nodded, and dropped his hand away, rummaging in his cloak, which brought the engineer’s attention to the technology partially embedded in the trickster’s body. The trickster pulled out a few memory sticks from one pocket, a few from another, and began to sort through them on the floor, some closer to his knee, a few others closer to Pepper. “I have that formula, and a few variations thereof, in these somewhere. It’s been a long time since I last needed it.”

“That’s my tech you’re wearing. No––it’s more advanced than my current tech, but still mine. Yeah that’s...” Tony sounded a little breathless. “What the hell have you done with it? Holy shit.” He knelt next to Pepper, staring. “That’s my reactor.”

“We both did this. Well, I did a lot of it, with things you started, and since then I have done half of the necessary repairs on it, but only when you were either unavailable, or deigned to let me, wherever I had landed,” Loki said lightly.

Tony blinked a bit at that. “You’ve met more than one of me.”

“I have met over one hundred versions of you.”

“How? Why? What the hell is this? Why are you coming to me?” Tony snapped.

“Us,” Pepper said. “Right?”

Loki nodded. “Both of you, when possible, or either of you, or myself, if one or both of you happened to be... missing in action,” he explained. “The heart of the ‘why’ is as difficult for me to consider explaining to you as it would be for you to believe it. In the big picture, I’m here to warn you about a coming threat to your universe, and make sure you are prepared to combat it. In truth, theoretically I could go to any of the Avengers for that, but it’s not them I’m doing it for, so I come to you.” He met Pepper’s stare steadily.

Inhaling sharply, she opened her mouth to respond, then closed it, confusion following the realization of what he meant. “Why for us? I don’t even know you. Tony barely knows you, even. We both thought you were dead.”

“I’ve arrived, truth be told, earlier than is convenient, but I won’t survive another jump,” the trickster sighed. “So I’m to make the best of it.” He pulled a few small pouches from thin air with a grimace, and began sorting the memory sticks into them. “These will be important for getting you both prepared for the battle aspect.” He pushed several toward Pepper’s hand. “Those may explain where I lack the time, a number of things. Some few here are, personal memories I wish to take with me, when my body is burned.” He re-pocketed a few of them. “Though you may tell me of their existence, if I don’t manage to tell myself in time. By the by, we do need to go to Asgard, so you might wish to call Thor with some haste. These ones, you will want to decrypt with me later. It is all you will need to know about the Cancer-verse, the Avatars of Life and Death, and how yes, it is actually important to prevent Thanos’ death even though you will want to kill him yourself ten times over, before this is all done with and your universe safe.” He handed the mad inventor a pouch of still more memory sticks, which Tony accepted numbly.

“So in your future, we’re uhm, important to you?” Pepper asked. “How?”

Loki looked at her with that expression from earlier again: pained and longing and happy in the most mournful way possible. _I know you, Pepper Potts. I know your full name, I know your favorite foods change based on the weather and which recipes most delight you. I know every constellation of freckles on your skin, almost as well as I know Tony’s scars, and how to surreptitiously monitor his dreams and keep nightmares at bay even though he always insisted that those dreams of his shouldn’t bother me_ , he didn’t say. He wanted to, but he didn’t. “You are... astonishing people.”

“Thank you?” she sounded unsure, and a little lost. “You’re looking at me like that again. I don’t know what to do when you look at me like that.”

The trickster opened his mouth, then snapped it shut. “I do not know what I should and should not say.”

“You’re creeping me the fuck out, actually,” Tony intoned gravely. “JARVIS, call Thor up. Tell him we need to ask him something, and that it’s important, but try to make sure to get the impression across we only want him along for this one.”

“He will try to embrace me,” Loki said flatly. “I hate it when he does that.”

“Keep on the floor, then,” Pepper said. “Given how tall he is, that’ll make him hesitate, given you won’t be as easy to reach unless he drops to the floor too.”

“Good plan. Thank you.” He looked up at Tony, who was glaring spitefully at him, and smiled warmly in response. “You’re always so attractive when you’re angry. I don’t mention it enough,” he offered.

“Normally I like flattery, but I’d really prefer an explanation,” the inventor said.

“I am from a timeline which, until my interference, ran parallel to yours in most respects. From my calculations, you have at least three years’ time before the threat which sent me away from my universe will threaten yours.” He looked away from them both briefly, hesitating a little before he continued, “Normally, within a year of that time, I would have finished my current project in Asgard, and made a colorful return to earth delivering far milder mischief than in my previous visits, mostly to annoy and agonize Thor, and also to entertain my dear friend Amora, who by that point would be in need of cheering up after Thor’s wedding to someone other than herself. In the process, I would get to know the both of you on surprisingly friendly terms, however clandestinely so with you, Tony, and somewhat deceptively with you, Pepper, at first.” He nodded to each of them.

The couple exchanged glances briefly, but did not interrupt.

Loki took that as permission to explain further, “Over that following year, various events and personality clashes would somehow result in my feeling safe in your company, and trusting you to hide me when I had nowhere else to go and was too injured to even begin to defend myself, which happened on a few occasions as bounty hunters from the Kree and Skrulls began to hunt me down with increasing force and frequency alike.” He smiled a bit wistfully. “All three of us exchanged life-saving debts with frequency, by then. I had slowly ceased causing mischief recreationally and focused on keeping you both safe from those who were after my hide for a prize. Eventually, war nearly broke out with the Kree, and you both stepped in on my behalf. You told them that they couldn’t have me, or the earth, and arranged for a show of force, hacking into their systems and damaging a few by hand, that sent them running with their metaphorical tails between their legs.” He cleared his throat. “In the peace that followed, we remained very close.”

“Close,” Peppe repeated quietly.

“Well, I was in love with both of you,” he admitted. “Deeply. It was not unrequited, either, or things would have turned out very differently, I’m sure.”

An awkward silence followed, as they both stared at him in shock.

“Yes, I had thought this would be about the reaction you’d both have,” Loki mused airily, then covered his mouth as he coughed unpleasantly for a moment.

“I’m still trying to figure out how we ever trusted you,” Tony said, but his voice was a little less sure, and a little more strained.

“Well... when the nature of my work in Asgard while convincing everyone I was dead came to light, it helped somewhat. Also, your getting to know more about Thanos, my fall into the abyss, and all the rest.” He cleared his throat. “Also the time I used my ice-related abilities to prevent you both dying from alterations an enemy made to Extremis in both of your systems which would have otherwise caused you both to combust, destroying me with you. I was lucky to be able to cool you both in time.”

Tony covered his mouth with a hand and slowly drew that hand down his face. “But... right now you––the Asgard you––still barely even knows us.”

“You caught my interest, Tony, during the invasion, but that was, so I thought, only a passing thought, not anything serious,” Loki admitted, “but it is... up to the three of you to work out how similar your future might become to mine. I can tell you what my own past experiences have been, and other universes I have seen which shared most of them, but nothing more.”

“Were we happy?” Pepper asked.

Loki closed his eyes, his whole expression cracking. “Yes. We were. I was the happiest I have ever been in my entire life,” he rasped. “Until I lost you both.”

The inventor and the now-less-fiery CEO exchanged hesitant glances. Pepper was the first to reach out, resting a hand over one of the trickster’s lightly.

The god sucked in a breath and turned his hand to clasp hers tightly for a moment, then loosened his hold as the nearby elevator doors sprung open and Thor stepped into the room.

“Anthony, JARVIS told me that you...” He stopped, trailing off into silence. “ _You_.” He started to stalk forward, staggering as he was caught between anger and shock, only to stop when the trickster coughed heavily and flinched back from his approach, then raised a hand in  gesture bidding him to stop with a pleading expression. There was blood on his hand and that, along with Loki’s face and obvious sickness, was enough to freeze the thunderer in his tracks, stunned and mildly bewildered.

“I swear on my soul that I am not from this universe; I’m just passing through, and about to be passing on, and you need to take me to your king immediately before then because I have important news to relay to him if you want to save this universe from a fate quite literally worse than death.” He tried and failed to get to his feet as his brother (now younger than him, Loki mused, if only technically, after all this time) continued to stare in shock, confusion and hurt.

“You died in my arms, Loki,” Thor rumbled.

“Well... about that,” the trickster groaned, and then went still and placid as Pepper and Tony each took one of his arms across their shoulders and helped him to his feet. “Oh, thank you,” he muttered.

“You’re looking a little pathetic, frankly,” Tony pointed out.

“I’m dying,” Loki retorted.

“He never said you didn’t have an excellent excuse,” Pepper added.

Helplessly, the trickster laughed, his head lolling forward, gripping their far shoulders with a familiar, longing and reassuring light squeeze, even as he coughed wetly once more, his breath beginning to smell still more strongly of his own sick blood as he swallowed it down convulsively.

“You suggest that you are alive elsewhere in this universe?” Thor asked.

“Yes, and I need to have words with me,” Loki sighed, not lifting his head. “Sooner, rather than later. My current life expectancy is mere hours, and those hours are in single-digits at present. _Please_ do get on with it, and take me to the All-Father.”

“You will tell Odin where my brother is?” Thor asked.

A hysterical giggle shook through the narrower god’s whole frame. “Something like that, yes.” He lifted his head. “It’s been some time since I have seen you well, brother. Thank you, for continuing to be a source of infinite amusement.”

The thunderer scowled at him in open suspicion, then. “Take him to the balcony. I will call upon Heimdall from there.” Seeing his brother struggle to walk and still propelled primarily by the two mortals aiding him, he followed with only a little hesitation. “You are truly unwell, Loki?”

“I swear to you all that I have yet to tell a lie since your arrival, Thor, and told not a single lie before you arrived, either,” Loki said, voice flat with mild exasperation and weariness both as he was carried through the doors out onto the balcony. He sighed a bit at the feel of the wind on his now-slightly-feverish skin.

Both mortals stiffened a little at that and shot Thor questioning looks.

“He does not lie. Had he lied and sworn to it, he would be screaming in agony for the price of oath-breaking,” Thor said, confused further when this didn’t actually seem to reassure either of them; although Loki seemed to relax after another moment or so, perhaps relieved that they had not abruptly dropped him. Closing the balcony door behind him, Thor stepped forward and bellowed skyward, “Heimdall! Open the bi-frost! I have guests!”

Then flashed a blaze of color and light, to transport them far away.

 

~~

 

The party of gods and mortals made their way up into the palace slowly, after Thor had initially carried them in a slightly-awkward manner over the rainbow bridge, and set them down when Loki was almost dropped for the third time.

The trickster thus spent most of the march through the palace, again supported by his two favorite mortals, cursing quietly under his breath.

“You lost us,” Tony said near the god’s ear, too quiet for the others to quite hear. “Then what?”

Loki let his head loll forward again, and sacrificed just a little magic, despite the pain, to whisper an answer only Tony would hear, in the ear not facing the trickster himself: “We could not stop the takeover of our world, and the ritual execution of the Avatar of Death, which brought Mistress Death herself forward in the one place, and time, that she could be killed. After your death, for you were the last I lost, I had become obsessed with escape. It was only while the device I currently wear was half-complete that their church caught up with me. I was infected with this virus, unable to cure it but able to be certain it would not spread to others, and I left just before Thanos died. I have no doubt my universe was lost to them, after I left. Since then, I have stopped them, almost every other time.”

“Almost?”

“One-hundred and sixty-two, and you, I hope. I won’t be able to see this one through to the end, Tony, I’m so sorry.” His voice shook, and Tony could feel tension coiling in the gods shoulders. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Hey,” he said, in the god’s ear. “We’ll make it.”

“You always say that,” Loki said, still in that whisper. “You’ve been wrong twenty times, you know. Don’t let yourself be twenty-one. Please.”

It was surreal, having his enemy’s future-self plead such a thing of him. Tony had to wonder what on earth (or off of it, for that matter) he had ever done, in any timeline, to earn devotion like that from the likes of the god of chaos. It was a strange thought, and all the stranger as Thor pushed open the doors to the throne-room, which Odin ordered guards and all others to clear from as soon as he saw the burden Thor’s companions carried, reminding him that he was carrying a god before a god-king for the sake of changing the future of all concerned. To say it was a bit surreal would be the under-statement of the century.

“Who is this impostor?” the All-Father demanded, as he descended his throne to meet them, and all the other doors around the room were shut and sealed.

“You always ask that, I swear,” Loki groaned, and lifted his head with a self-deprecating grin. He looked genuinely amused now, albeit very bitterly so. “Váli.”

Odin’s face fell.

“What?” Thor asked, bemused.

“It was the name Angrboða would have given Hela, had she borne a son,” Loki explained casually. “It is something only I would know.”

Tony’s eyes widened slowly. _Only I_. _Not ‘only Odin and I’_. The inventor realized immediately the god’s meaning. “You sneaky son of a bitch.”

The heavily scarred trickster crowed a laugh, then coughed and had to hold his breath for a moment as the tremors passed, trying to keep from spilling blood and bits of lung everywhere while ha had no hand free to contain it.

Thor shook his head. “Why do you utter this?”

“Proof he is who he seems to be,” Odin rumbled. “I recall it.”

Pepper was still a little bemused, but it seemed sensible to conclude that the king was implying he and Loki had come up with such a thing ahead of time, until a sidelong glance showed her the evil mirth on the trickster’s face, and the awestruck shock on Tony’s, as well as Thor’s nod of easy acceptance. These three things, to her, suggested she was still missing something.

“Thor, leave us,” the king commanded.

“I will not leave,” the thunderer declared.

Odin shot him a glare, and waved his hand.

Thor vanished. Banging on the now-sealed doors and faint enraged demands for them to be opened, in Thor’s voice, followed a moment later.

The All-Father approached Loki, eyeing the mortals who supported him with considerable confusion. “Strange company you choose to arrive with, trickster.”

“Oh, I find them quite familiar. I’m from your future, by the by, not this universe, but one damned close enough if Váli was still the right name. I must be very similar indeed, don’t you think, to matching your Loki?” His voice was teasing, almost crowing despite being a bloody rasp, but then he turned it suddenly cold as ice and vicious: “ _Think what must have driven me so far as this_ ,” he hissed, “and _be sincere_.”

Odin’s stare remained steady and passive for a long few moments. “What are they do to with this?” he asked quietly.

“Everything,” the traveler said without hesitation, a thousand words worth of emotion in the tone of his voice. “Trust them.”

The All-Father took a half-step back, expression disbelieving and somehow more pinched than seemed suited to his face. “You’re kidding,” he deadpanned.

“I am wearing a locket around my neck. Pull it up by the chain,” Loki commanded, tilting his head back helpfully when Odin cooperated, pulling the pendant up and holding it with some hesitation. “I was aware I would arrive early, but not so early as this. I put a memory in there for you, as well as evidence. Open it, and see.”

Slowly, Odin did so. With the open locket in hand, his eyes glowed green for a moment as he seemed to slip into a trance for just a few seconds. Then it faded and he took a shaking breath, viewing the images inside the locket for a long moment before snapping it shut and taking a few unsteady steps back. The illusion of the king faded entirely, leaving a younger and less scarred version of Loki Lie-smith standing pale and shaken and horrified in its place. “ _No_.”

“Would I lie to myself about so grave a matter as that?” the older version of the trickster almost bellowed, voice all a wreck, but he maintained his volume and enthusiasm regardless. “You know me, and I know you even better still, and you know what would drive me to this. _You_ now know what I’ve lost, to make me this desperate and drive me so far through hundreds of other universes to preserve a happiness that I can no longer have back for myself, but which I can revisit and make possible where no others could, because it is _too important_ to be lost; do you not see?”

“I see,” the younger conceded, eyes shining and his voice shaking.

His more scarred counterpart from far away huffed then, relaxing and letting his head hang loosely forward again. “That’s the easiest this argument has ever gone,” he sighed. “I had hoped that would work. Usually I don’t show you that much so early, if at all. Thank you, because I _am_ dying, you see, and really haven’t the energy for the usual fight over this.”

“How many times have we had this fight, exactly?” Trying to regain his composure, while avoiding the all-too curious gazes of people he hardly knew, who were apparently more valuable than he was yet prepared to face, the younger stepped closer again, shaking hands folded behind his back.

“Five, I think.”

“They must have been memorable.”

“I had to almost kill you, once.”

“I’m hardly surprised. All things considered.” He looked at Tony, then, hesitantly.

The inventor stared back. “Trust me, I find this fucking weird, too.”

The younger trickster shook his head, faintly amused, then looked to Pepper curiously. “I’m aware of you, but I believe we’ve never met, Miss Potts.” He proffered a hand politely.

She shook it. “What did he show you?”

Loki’s throat worked tightly. “Half a decade in under three seconds.”

“Come now, it was _heavily_ abridged,” the elder scolded.

“Whatever was it that clawed up your face like that?” the younger inquired. “It suits you well enough, but I still would prefer to avoid it, if at all possible.”

“Keep away from motel bathrooms,” the elder responded gravely. “Especially on planets outside the nine realms. Just friendly advice. You want to know no more than that. I certainly don’t want to go into it, when we’ve got to discuss Mar-Vell. Is he dead yet, in this one? It seems to be a 50-50 chance, at best, between this chain of parallel universes and forking timelines...”

“He died just last year, of cancer,” Pepper offered.

“Oh good,” the elder sighed. “No additional wandering Avatar of Life for them to attempt to convert as soon as they sense the alterations my arrival has made to the time-stream and the shape of events. They should still be worse at it than they used to be, by my standards, but they will still have a feeling. Luckily, it will be very off-putting for them to be unable to find me, given I will be conveniently dead.”

“The sickness in you, it feeds off of your magic?” the younger inquired.

“Yes, don’t worry about it. Just make certain they burn my body very thoroughly. Use a spell to prevent my ashes getting into any water supplies and I should go over the edge into oblivion without causing any plague.”

“Do you seriously think of _everything_?” Pepper asked sharply.

Said Loki-the-traveler, “I’ve been at this a very, very long time, now.”

“Was it worth it?” his younger self asked.

“Yes. Every time. Every jump. Even of the failures, few were complete failures. There was almost always someone saved, and not left alone. It... it has been worth it enough that I look forward to my rest, and perhaps meeting mine again, beyond Hel,” responded the elder, with cool certainty. “Don’t fuck this up, Loki.”

“I will try my best, but your alterations of the timeline...” He glanced at the locket his alternate self carried. “Do you think they-”

“I know not. It may not be them, but I would hope... Well, you can guess.”

Loki-the-native nodded slowly. “I can. I might ask Hel...”

“Don’t force it. Never force them to those expectations.”

“I meant for you, to learn more of what we might expect, even after...”

“You may require some of her aid, yes. I have come so very far.”

Loki touched the face of his older self. “You have a high fever.”

“I’ve got about an hour, and you have a king to wake up earlier than planned.”

“I do?” the younger queried hesitantly, with a grimace.

“You do.” It was, without question, a command.

“You had better not be wrong,” the Loki of this universe growled.

“I’m not,” responded the more foreign one.

“Stark, if you will please go to the throne room doors, they should open lightly at your touch, but Thor is banging heavily on the left one, so do take care to keep to the right,” the false-king requested.

Tony let go of the other Loki. “Yeah, sure. You good, Pep?”

“He’s not that heavy,” she responded, and looked amused when the Loki from her universe appeared so surprised by that. “I’m a bit enhanced, lately.” She raised a hand, showing off a little flame, and admiring the curious look it earned her.

“I do not even know you,” he mused quietly.

“I know, right?” she sighed.

Both tricksters smirked, though only the older one was relaxed enough to chuckle weakly too. The younger one then turned and strode up to the throne, finding a hidden panel on it which caused the stairs to lift and a sarcophagus-like structure to slide out from under them. He looked uneasy as he pulled it further out and into the middle of the area before the throne.

Pepper could make out the face of the sleeping king, under a thick, humming barrier that seemed to radiate waves of alternating heat and cold. She looked at the injured trickster when he made a noise of interest.

“That wasn’t how I wove it,” he explained lightly. “It’s better.” He shot his alternate self a curious look. “You’re different from me, somehow.”

“Aside from the obvious?” the younger inquired.

Queried the elder, “What am _I_ missing?”

Looking over the containment spell-work which held Odin suspended in a deeper version of the Odin-sleep, time slowed down to keep him there, the less scarred trickster said, very quietly, “I do not have the casket any longer.”

“Nor did I. I returned it to Jotunnheim, to the monarch,” the elder said.

“I took it to Nifelheim, and brought Jotunnheim’s king back under authority of the Three,” the younger explained, smirking a little. “Did you not know they had crafted it?”

“I... did.” The elder’s brow furrowed. “What are you to them?”

“I am to Asgard what they are to Jotunnheim and Nifelheim, in their eyes,” the trickster responded. “Why did you give that weapon to Jotunnheim?”

“Their primary monarch, a respectable queen, requested it.”

“Ah, my Jotunnheim has a few kingdoms, though the most powerful is ruled by Býleistr Laufeyson, my half-brother. It did not occur to me to offer him the weapon at all, given all rumor was that he took after our father strongly; although that turned out later, thankfully, to be exaggeration.”

The elder shook his head with a light huff. “Always, there is something.”

“Have you seen other versions of me who have done as I have?”

A nod from the other. “Several. You will start fewer wars, your way. I wish I had done as you have.”

“This is the most surreal day of my entire life to date,” Pepper mused. “You two are ridiculous.”

The elder whispered in her ear, so his other self would not hear, “Secretly, darling, we are always ridiculous, and never should we forget it, but try to be gentle with his pride, when it has to do with some of his actual plots.”

The woman blushed deeply. “I did not sign up for this.”

The elder lifted his head away, huffing a dry laugh as Thor boomed back into the room. “None of us ever seemed to. Things just fell into place.” He sounded more tired suddenly, and perhaps a little dazed.

His other self stepped over quickly, placing hands on either side of his neck and causing the temperature to drop so sharply Pepper was left gasping. “You will need your fire, Miss Potts, but only to protect yourself as you may need. He is overheating badly.”

“You’re blue,” she said a bit numbly, maintaining her temperature enough to avoid anything like sudden frostbite.

“It happens, when Jotunn of an icy elemental nature are very afraid, angry, or otherwise emotionally volatile, or when they feel threatened, or when exposed to extreme cold,” Loki explained softly, as his scarred self groaned in relief and became equally blue only a little more sluggishly, his scars standing out all the more garishly pale in contrast.

“It looks good on you, but I was a little caught off-guard,” Pepper said. “That’s all.”

The less ill trickster shot her a surprised and slightly disbelieving look.

“Thanks,” Loki-the-traveler grunted.

“None needed.” Lowering his hands, his younger double elaborated, “I need you thinking clearly. I daresay we will need all the clever words we can get, if you really expect me to be able to leave here in one piece.” Distantly, he heard Tony frantically shouting for Thor to stop and listen. Without looking up he abruptly encased the thunderer in ice with a bit of concentration and an abrupt gesture. “Tony, if you have any small tools about your person, consider tapping the inch or so of ice around his face. It should loosen easily, and if he can breathe, he will be too focused on that to get his hammer off the floor immediately.”

Tony pulled a multi-tool from his pocket, using a glass-breaking corner to crack away a bit at the ice.

“I’m going to give you advice you won’t like,” said the elder Loki.

“By the Norns, how much more have you to say to me?” he growled.

“More than I have time for. You know how I got here this easily? This quickly? Because it’ll work for you too, if you let it. If you’ll do one thing for me, here, and trust me enough to trust them,” said the elder.

“How?”

Leaning closer, he whispered in the younger god’s ear.

Loki’s jaw clenched, and he stepped back, facing Thor as his brother gasped for air and snarled out his name like an accusation, once his face was freed and Tony stepped back.

“Peace, Thor. Listen, and I will explain. Once I have explained, I swear to free you, and you may attack me or not, as you wish. Will you be still?”

The thunderer took a few more shallow breaths, restricted by the ice all around him. “I will hear your story, but I will have trouble believing a word of it.”

“For the past three years, since you reported my death, I have ruled Asgard, Thor. It has been me. Odin was here.” He gestured at the sarcophagus. “I am about to let him out, and have to explain myself. Will you remain still, if I let you free of the ice?”

Thor considered. “You swear you will free him?”

The trickster rolled his eyes. “Yes, Thor. I’ve gotten rather disturbing news from myself from an alternative future. My priorities have just shifted. Now will you stand audience and not interfere?”

“I will not interfere with my own words unless you try to escape early yourself, but I will not let you leave here until this is done,” the thunderer demanded. Then the ice around him crumbled, melted, and fast-evaporated into nothing with a sweeping heat-spell that left the blond god sweating a little in its wake.

“I accept your terms,” Loki the younger said. “That said, I have a few more acts to conduct as king before waking him.”

“ _Loki_ ,” Thor warned, then caught something his brother flung at him. He stared at the golden apple for a moment. “What is this?”

“A gift for Dr. Jane Foster,” Loki said. “Oh behalf of the rightful King of Asgard.”

A flicker of magic wreathed it for a moment where Thor held it, and stared in disbelief. “You... really have...” He turned his disbelieving stare onto his brother. “Why?”

“Because your moping is pathetic to behold, and it will annoy Odin _very_ deeply.” He tossed a couple more projectiles toward the mortals, who each caught an apple of their own, which they stared at with wide eyes before looking back at the acting king with confusion on their faces.

“We...” Pepper began. “But you... What is this?”

“Insurance that I might have time to get to know you both the better, on behalf of the rightful King of Asgard,” Loki said, inclining his head. Again, both apples bore a bit of extra shimmer in the air around them for a few moments.

“Oh, _very_ clever,” his other self murmured, grateful and a little stunned.

“Uh, the Extremis in her system-” Tony started.

“Harmless addition:  you can still remove it from her system with a couple of the formulae I gave you, if you want, but it will actually stabilize Extremis considerably,” the elder trickster explained. “I recommend eating those before Odin can make any attempts to stop you or reverse the process.”

“You owe me nothing,” the other Loki reassured.

“What the fuck did he show you?” Tony asked, even as he took a bite.

The Loki native to this universe opened his mouth to answer, then shut it, looking a bit at a loss. “I do not know if I could even begin to explain without bringing about an awkward degree of culture shock and sounding a bit asinine, actually.”

Both mortals exchanged questioning looks, but Pepper took her first bite of her own apple without hesitation.

Once two of the three gifts were devoured and Thor had tucked his own into a pouch carried at his hip, Loki reached out with one hand and much of his magic, to release the complex locking and protective mechanisms he had sealed Odin under. That freed, he lifted the transparent lid, leaving behind only the solid base of the container, and vanished it. Leaning over it, he called down, “Odin Borson! Awake!”

The king’s eyes snapped open and he reached out to grab Loki by the throat but the younger trickster seized his wrist hard enough to stop him. More powerful generally though he might be, Odin was still weak from too-long slumber. “You traitor!”

“Only a little,” Loki assured, droll and mocking. “Really, I was just making a few points as clear as possible. I also had intent to humiliate you in addition, before leaving, but plans apparently have changed.” He shot his other self a glare which communicated a hint of resentment, even as he released hold of the All-Father and took a few sharp steps back away from him. He was a master provocateur, but not suicidal, after all.

“It went well, when I did it,” the elder Loki called. “It was a great plan!”

Pepper shushed him.

Odin sat up slowly, as though in pain, and stared hard at the other trickster, who waved at him cheekily, the human woman he leaned upon, and the human man standing at his other side looking reluctantly amused. “What madness is this?”

“I have very little idea, as yet, but let me explain your own situation briefly, before we get to that: you have been resting for three years. During that time, as myself I have established positive diplomatic relations with Nifelheim on Asgard’s behalf, to the point they are almost willing to meet you. Furthermore, the Three of Nifelheim once more have the kingdoms, yes plural, of Jotunnheim under their sovereignty, and are at work  with them to de-ice that world slowly over the next century or so, until it resembles its old self. Apparently, there may even be survivors deep below the ice delivered there generations ago by Laufey’s father.”

Loki held up both hands, like he was weighing a world in each palm. “Both worlds are now enthusiastically declaring themselves peaceful allies of Asgard. Also, in your guise, I stopped two wars in Alfheim which both wanted your support on one side or another, in favor of launching both aggressors after hordes of raiders once more pestering Vanaheim, as penitence for their rabble-rousing.” He brought his palms together as he spoke, and then parted them in an insultingly lazy shrug. “I have, in short, done more for your inter-realm diplomacy within three years than you have in three centuries.”

He waved one hand dismissively as he added, as a parting shot, “Oh, also, trade is prospering nicely between all of the realms, now that I have introduced a few mages of Jotunnheim and Alfheim to a number of the paths between realms which give them access to each other and a few secure places within Asgard (safely within Heimdall’s eye) which would otherwise require either long-term voyage ships or use of the bi-frost for them to reach. You may now cease believing you are in any way my better, admit that I have no reason to be jealous of Thor for his right to the throne given just how tedious and dull much of that was, and my easily handing back over to you while you nurse your wounded pride, because to be frank I just don’t want it.”

“You have still committed crimes against Jotunnheim and Midgard that-” Odin began.

“Earth has dropped them, since reports of his death, and the fact he did sort of ‘die’ seemingly saving all of the realms along with Thor,” Tony cut in, his voice infuriatingly mild. “There aren’t exactly procedures in place for ‘alien threats come back from the dead’, given it’s not exactly happened to us before, that modern civilization, only recently capable of really holding any of you accountable, still recalls.”

“Also, his position with the Three would probably be of a sort we’d consider ‘diplomatic immunity’ being applicable to,” Pepper suggested. “Also, he mentioned that... Well, I’m guessing the Three are some sort of high council, a little, but not sovereign rulers per se? Above kings sort of and maybe not subject to laws laid by kings accordingly.” At Loki’s nod and slightly stunned expression, though he did not look directly at her with it, she continued, “Right. Well, he sort of mentioned that what they are to Jotunnheim and Nifelheim, they consider him to occupy that same above-sovereignty sort of position for Asgard, unofficially or no. You really might want to consider how they might respond to his being suddenly detained or otherwise criminalized for ‘bringing peace’ essentially, with their aid and all.”

“And I have not only made my amends personally with Jotunnheim, but I have _made peace_ with them and given them a path to future prosperity to recover from their centuries of deprivation in the wake of a war which left them with so little,” Loki concluded firmly, shooting the two humans wary, but not ungrateful glances.

“Your thoughts on this, Thor?” Tony inquired lightly.

“I am still slightly in shock,” the thunderer admitted, “but also rather proud of my brother, honestly, and chagrinned, and deeply irritated that he led me to falsely believe he had died quite _intentionally_ this time.” He glared at the younger trickster.

“You’ll need him to fight off the Cancer-verse,” added the elder Loki “I swear on my soul and the short life-span I’ve got left that he’ll be a vital component in saving this entire damned universe, especially since I won’t be around to do it. I left a series of encrypted files with these charming mortals, which only I can crack.” He paused, then gestured between his selves. “Well he can, too, obviously. Just us, though.”

“I have work to do, it seems, All-Father,” the younger Loki said with a bow, and turned on his heel to leave the fresh-thawed king cursing after him.

“You expect me to trust you both in this, and to let you free?” Odin called.

“Yes,” said Loki the younger, turning back to face the king again sharply. “I do. Would you lock me up, with Thor to spread the word of all the good I have done for Asgard? Only from his lips would they believe it, Odin Borson. Mine, no, but Thor’s? And these two new citizens of Asgard as well, both trustworthy and heroic, and at least one perhaps even pure of heart?” He gestured toward both humans who still supported his sickly elder self.

“She might actually be,” Tony conceded.

Pepper rolled her eyes at both of them and tisked.

“Citizens,” Odin repeated, disbelieving, even as he pulled himself to his feet.

“I was rightful king. Thor declined the throne, even,” Loki teased, but then his voice went hard and glacial as he added, “The laws are on their side, and I promise you that it will much easier for us both if you will treat them accordingly. I will steal any future apples they might be owed if you would dare try to prevent them, and you do not wish to go to war with me, especially now I have had three years to build safeguards for myself throughout your house and kingdom.”

“What are they to you?” the All-Father asked. “That you would do this for them?”

“I hardly know yet,” the younger trickster admitted freely. “But I want to find out.”

An unpleasant cough, then a few still more violent ones, escaped the elder trickster. He wiped the red from his lips with a grimace. “I’d say that covers it, really.”

His younger self looked alarmed. “You have more I need to know.”

The elder pulled a pouch of memory sticks from one pocket. “I’ll have to let memories and their stories talk for me, then. One of you should know all of it, I guess. I would keep them, but-” He coughed again. “I still have them. Every one of them.”

“I have another apple if-” the younger started, even as he took the pouch and vanished it up his sleeve without hesitation.

“I’m beyond the aid of apples; they would only feed the disease,” the elder cut off. “Away from here, please. I don’t want it to be here.”

“Thor?” the younger god called. “I plan to leave. Will you stop me?”

The thunderer stared at him for a moment, hesitant, but then shook his head. “No. Father, you should not either.”

“Perhaps so,” the king sighed, banishing the sarcophagus with a gesture. “Go, where you are needed, my son.”

“Not your son,” Loki shot back. “But I go in peace, if you can accept that.” He raised a hand, and in a flash of green fire and smoke, he vanished both of his selves, and both humans, from Asgard altogether.

 

~~

 

They landed back in the penthouse.

Pepper stared up into the eyes of the more foreign version of Loki, god of chaos, the first of them again able to look at him, and he stared in turn back at her. He was so removed from her own world and her own understanding, that the strange blessing of his lips kissing her brow, just a moment later, left her feeling still, and sad, and a little confused, yet strangely soothed.

Tony, by contrast, was confused, and just a little offended, but mostly warmed in an inexplicable fashion when the more scarred, older trickster kissed his forehead, before releasing all hold on both inventor and CEO.

Loki the younger just had time to glance around only briefly at the remodeled decor of the penthouse before his elder self slipped free of Pepper’s grip, while she was still a bit stunned, and seized the younger trickster by his collar, leaning heavily on him, forcing the less scarred god to grip his upper arms hard to keep them both upright.

“I can’t have mine back, but you need to know you can trust them that far,” the elder hissed, quieter than the two humans would hear. “You don’t know how much you need them, yet.”

The younger nodded, swallowing tightly. “Thank you. I will do my best.” He continued to support the other’s weight, at first, then helped him slowly lower to the floor, where they both knelt, the elder a bit more bonelessly than his counterpart, when the coughing began again, far worse this time. In such close proximity, the younger god could hear the occasional cracking strain of bone against metal where the spasming respiratory failures put undue stress on components of technology seemingly woven into the god’s very ribcage.

“Is he-” Pepper sounded worried.

The healthier Loki glanced up at her briefly, seeing the sincere hurt in her expression, and shook his head. Looking back down at his older self he had to ask, “Any regrets?”

“Too many.” Loki-the-traveler shook his head, focusing on getting the words out making it easier to hold back the coughing. Staccato and strained, he continued, “But I chose it that way. When I lost them. I was dying, but I had a way out, a way to find them again, even if I could never have back everything... I could make it more true. The more universes we exist across, the more true we are, you know that? That’s how multiverses work, how probability threads in magic can get woven, how it all works.” His brow rested against that of his other self. “Don’t waste this. Don’t you dare.”

Loki-the-native swallowed thickly. “I know myself too well not to trust you, seeing this, and seeing... do you know how much pain I see in you?”

“Please, no. I don’t want to know how bad I am at hiding it, by this point.”

They both laughed, sad and bitter, at that.

“Rest well, old friend,” said the younger, after the laughter died and one more cracking cough tore through his other self’s body.

“Thank you.”

“No, thank _you_.” He glanced up uncertainly at the two humans watching them with a mixture of sadness, confusion and empathy. “I think.”

One more low laugh, sounding wet with the same blood that dripped red-and-black from the corner of his mouth, then a painful wheeze in, one last sputtering half-breath out, and the older one was gone, slowly going limp as his senses faded and all strength went with them.

The one left living felt the life go out of his other self, the loss of pulse, the foreign-yet-familiar soul departing the run-ragged body for a place unknown. Loki exhaled a long breath he hadn’t quite realized he’d been holding.

“He’s gone.” He began weaving a spell like a coffin, heavy with respect, and a pocket-universe to store it in, until he could return to Asgard to arrange a funeral ship.

“What are you doing?” Tony asked.

“Putting a small morgue up my sleeve,” Loki responded.

“The fact you can hide a body _up your sleeve_ might just be the creepiest thing about you I’ve learned so far,” the inventor remarked.

“He specified how he wanted his funeral to go,” Pepper chided. “We don’t have a world with edges, here, like he seemed inclined to fall over.”

“Yes,” said the trickster, and the body soon vanished. He felt heavier for carrying it, even though he shouldn’t. Sitting back heavily, he bent his legs up before him and folded his arms across his knees, tilting his head back to stare into the ceiling for a few moments. “Now what?”

Tony coughed politely, not looking at the trickster’s elegant profile or the too-pretty lines of that pale throat. “We have a lot of file decryption to do.”

“Right,” Loki said, and looked from one to the other of them. “I think I should get to know you both, if you would not mind.”

“What did he show you?” Pepper asked again.

“His family,” the trickster said, with open reluctance.

Slowly, that sunk in.

“Oh my god,” the CEO whispered. “You’re serious.”

Running a hand through his hair, the god nodded once, not making eye contact with either of them.

“Wait a minute,” Tony said. “There’s... math I’m missing.”

“Dizygotic twins,” Loki added. “That should solve your equation.” The simple answer, he decided, would have to do. The complications which muddled hereditary trait inheritances due to magic and the nature of twins in such instances, he was still trying not to think overly much about. _If one twin is a mage, there is no doubt that the other is too, in no instance in all of history; however deeply buried one gift might be._ In the case that locket and his other self’s memories had shown him, the gifts were not buried very deeply at all.

He struggled not to let those memories sink further into his mind than they already had. That life was not his own; there were no guarantees it ever would be. Instead, he focused on the rather amusing facial expressions of mortals suddenly aware of exactly why he had avoided mentioning this entire topic earlier.

The inventor was particularly stricken-looking, and a bit pale. “You-” He tried to say more, but no words came out.

“That... version of me, that alternate self I might become, knew you both, did he not?” the trickster asked lightly. “Perhaps too well?”

The two humans exchanged glances.

“Yeah,” Pepper said. “He... told us about how exactly that happened.”

“I would hear that tale at some point later, if you don’t mind.” He pulled himself to his feet. “I don’t expect I might be as lucky as he, but even if I am not, clearly the two of you are more valuable than I can currently fathom.” He looked between them again and raised both his hands in a gesture of supplication. “I know neither of you, and I am terrified of trusting you, but I am willing to try, if you don’t mind, to understand what just happened to all of us, and perhaps to my... alternate self who just died here. I expect nothing, save perhaps not being killed or imprisoned before we solve these puzzles and save the universe. A fair exchange, for Asgardian citizenship, perhaps?”

“Is this what you being earnest looks like?” Tony asked.

“It’s an attempt,” Loki conceded.

“It’s somehow awkward, yet a little terrifying.”

Pepper elbowed him. “In any case, all three of us have a universe to preserve. Let’s start there, shall we?”

The trickster cleared his throat. “Yes, that would be ideal.”

“Then put your hands down, you’re not under arrest. I do think you might be certifiably insane, and I’m still not over the fact you just handed us pseudo-immortality on a sort of desperate whim, but I think I can come to terms with that,” Tony responded.

The god looked a little sheepish as he folded his hands behind his back as casually as possible. “It was an instinctive reaction to realizing I might need a pair of mortals, honestly. I’ve seen Thor’s issues there, and his angst is ridiculous. I felt a desire to maintain what is left of my dignity.”

“If dignity really mattered, Tony would be in real trouble,” Pepper commented.

The inventor frowned at her a little petulantly.

She fluttered her eyelashes innocently at him in response.

Loki tried and failed to smother a laugh.

Tony raised the first pouch of memory sticks he’d been handed and shook it. “To start: what the hell do you use to read these things?”

“Well, the first layer is imagery, though there is a still more vast amount of raw statistical data in the larger ones,” Loki explained. “The latter will require time for even me to decrypt, I have no doubt, but there may be more basic introductory presentations in the other media layers, which will require only the right reader and a compatible illusory-projection device. Thus, I believe we should begin in your lab.”

“This way,” Pepper agreed, tugging once at Loki’s sleeve on her way past him, as she led the way. The two men exchanged glances briefly. The trickster gave a flourishing ‘after you’ gesture, and Tony snorted, but followed, the god at his back.

 

~~

 

After fifteen minutes of Loki constructing an improvised media-reading device that seemed oddly crystal-based to Tony, during which time the inventor opened up the nearest liquor cabinet and got them all a couple of strong drinks, Loki placed one of the memory sticks into it and an illusory projection more detailed than any holograms on the market began to unfold before them. It was, as Loki said the label had indicated, a run-down of the operations of the Cancer-verse and its eating its way through the multiverse as a whole like a worm through an apple.

The Cancer-verse itself was a product of a twisted version of the Avatar of Life, who took advantage of a series of events surrounding himself, as well as the resources of the Kree and the Avengers, to kill the physical manifestation of Death in one of the only times and places she could be killed permanently, after which nothing and no one would ever die in that universe, ever again. Life without death: unchecked growth and mutation and pain, just like a cancer.

The result was a universe where all things were immortal but also starving and unable to feed themselves with non-living matter after a certain point because desperation would lead them to convert every possible thing into fuel for consumption, until there was nothing left but the living. Furthermore, nothing could end disease or harmful mutations that caused infinite pain and suffering, and even former heroes warped into monstrous and nearly unrecognizable things. When the hunger grew too great, all life in that universe worked toward reaching out into another to convert and devour, by the same formula that had “freed” them.

It was a simple enough formula; kill the Avatar of Death at the right time and place, and Mistress Death will have no choice but to appear there, to collect him. Mistress Death herself could then be killed, though only by the Avatar of Life.

The Avatar of Life and Avatar of Death topics were covered before it was brought up that Thanos was the Avatar of Death and to be preserved at all costs.

The sound of something shattering accompanied that message.

Pepper and Tony looked over to discover it had been the glass in Loki’s hand, which he had emptied of all scotch a few moments before.

The trickster cleared his throat and paused the projection. The room brightened a bit as the illusion retreated. “My apologies.” He pulled two particularly sharp glass shards out of his skin and then cleaned up all the rest with a gesture and a syllable, the glass becoming whole again before their eyes.

“So... what’s Thanos, exactly? The uh...” Tony hesitated. “We have to come up with something to call him that isn’t ‘the other you’ I think, or this will just get awkward.”

“The Traveler,” Loki said quietly. “That is, after all, what he did a great deal of.”

“Yeah. Would you...” the inventor hesitated.

“Would you do the same?” Pepper asked.

The god considered. “Having lost what he had, and been in his position? Dying? Utterly alone in a universe about to become a place where I couldn’t die no matter how much I wanted to?” He grimaced. “I would have fled, certainly, if it were obvious that it could not be stopped. I do not know how he got the idea to... continue to protect those he loved even in other universes, wherever he could. I believe that he was punishing himself over and over, for that loss, and I cannot say that doesn’t sound like something I might not attempt.” He pushed his repaired glass in Tony’s direction

The inventor refilled it.

Loki drank half of it in one swallow. “Thanos is from the moon of Titan, but he is no longer welcome there, given that last time he was banished and returned, it was with great violence as he killed many of his own people, including his mother. His father is still king, there. He conducted further atrocities, too many to recount, but the most notable being the destruction of two thirds of all life in the universe with a weapon powerful enough to manipulate reality itself to his whims. Most of that horror was unmade, in the end, but no one ever forgot it, for obvious reasons.” He took another long sip of his drink. “The Chitauri, all of them you killed, which was the entirety of their race, were perhaps one tenth of his army, when last I parted ways with him.”

“Sounds like he’s well-armed enough, then?” Tony asked hesitantly.

The trickster gave an unpleasant grimace. “I... arranged for matters otherwise, given his treatment of me when his troops were those who found me, after I fell from the bi-frost. I was first treated as an exciting new biological specimen, instead of a person, and subject to the sort of casual tortures usually reserved for lab animals which lack _sentience_ of any kind.” He cleared his throat. “I apologize for the over-kill required to destroy his army by botching the invasion of New York without appearing to betray him until the very last.”

“Back up,” the inventor snapped. “What’s this bullshit?”

“I swear to you on my life: I had no true intention to rule this world. You just _watched_ me casually abdicate the throne of _Asgard_ , Stark. Just because I fooled you as well as every other member of my audience is no reason to be rude,” he mocked.

“I actually suspected you botched it, and every time I brought it up, someone shot me down, jackass,” Tony riposted. “I now get to serve S.H.I.E.L.D. the biggest ‘I told you so’ in the history of me bad-mouthing S.H.I.E.L.D., because I totally called that shit! You should’ve just nicked a reactor and headed for the north pole!”

“And opened the portal to its full width,” Loki added, amused.

“See!” Tony turned to Pepper, with a wild gesture.

She ran a hand through his hair like she was humoring him. “I do remember that argument with Fury a couple of times after New York, yes.”

“Thank you,” the inventor said softly. “So, you basically made it look like you failed the invasion, rather than betrayed directly?”

“Well...” Loki cleared his throat. “No. The loss of the Chitauri fleet acted as a beacon to a nearby massive fleet of Skrulls, whom I had contacted before I left. It would have thrown Thanos’ ranks into utter disarray and set them on alert for any further attacks, but by the time they sent the alarms out, their central defenses would have already been under siege. From what I’ve managed to capture of Skrull intelligence since then, they took out over half of his fleet, his best assassin betrayed him and was picked up by a band of heroes called the Guardians of the Galaxy, who tried to again kill Thanos, apparently for the third time just themselves. He has since been brought back to life again, according to my daughter, but is being kept imprisoned somewhere beyond her sight. He has been imprisoned successfully, so far as I have been able to discern, for the past two years.” He pushed his freshly-emptied glass toward the inventor again.

Tony refilled the trickster’s glass and then his own, which Pepper picked up and took a respectable swig from before handing it back to him.

“So he’s somewhere, we don’t know where, but given he’s been imprisoned thoroughly, they probably know a lot about him,” she mused.

Loki nodded. “I... do not know if I trust myself with his protection. He is...” The trickster hesitated, running his tongue along the edges of his teeth. “It was with good reason I set his ruin into motion, and he will not be pleased to see me ever again either.”

“By the way, you didn’t actually kill Coulson,” Tony added.

“Hmm?” He raised both eyebrows.

“The S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who shot you with a gun modeled after the Destroyer,” Tony clarified, “after you’d stabbed him through the chest.”

“Oh, right. Good for him, I suppose.”

The inventor made a face. “You’re still an asshole, you know.”

“I hope you don’t expect to redeem me at all,” Loki deadpanned.

“Even miracle-workers of my caliber have limits, Raditz.”

Loki blinked. “Is this another pop-culture nickname?”

“Maybe,” Tony conceded.

“It does seem a bit callous when you’re fairly nonchalant about killing someone we considered a close friend,” Pepper pointed out lightly. “Well, I did. Tony had only learned that week that his first name was ‘Phil’, of course.” She shot the inventor a pointed look.

Frowning a little, the engineer stared determinedly into his drink.

Loki appeared amused. “Oh I see. So in part your anger with me was that he was so _newly shiny_ to you, personally. My apologies.”

“Let’s go back to how you’re not allowed to kill Thanos for a long while,” Tony said in airy tones.

The trickster cursed under his breath and lifted his drink to his lips again, draining it very swiftly.

“Loki,” Pepper asked lightly, watching the engineer refill Loki’s glass without prompting this time, possibly as a minor peace offering. “Exactly how far can we trust you to be sincere with us on this project?”

The god blinked a bit at her, staring steadily, only a little surprised at how easily she held his gaze and read his expression keenly without actually appearing too shrewd or suspicious. Sincere, light and perceptive curiosity was always refreshing, and clearly this woman possessed it in spades. It caused the trickster to feel a bit warmed despite attempts to keep himself as unaffected by the pair of them as possible until he had them better mapped within his own understanding. “I...” He hesitated, clearly conflicted and uncertain, but he took a steadying breath and began again. “I am willing to promise you both that I will not willingly cause you harm with any malicious intent, so long as I am not betrayed by either of you,” he said slowly. “If you might wish me to.”

“That’s a lot, from you,” Tony said, his brow furrowed.

“I... have had a very long time to get to know myself, Tony Stark,” Loki said. “I have had occasion to see myself in love, and heartbroken, and for a few short periods of time, genuinely happy.” He ran a hand down over his face for a moment, as though trying to wipe away the ghost of emotions not his own. “I have seen myself in the mirror on many occasions that I was _close_ to being as whole as that Traveler was before his losses, but never was I affected so deeply by love that I could be so shattered and yet still closer to whole and with purpose than he.” He looked Tony in the eye, then, trying to puzzle him out, and puzzle out his own psyche at the same time, silently asking the same questions of both. “I am trying to understand how, and why, and what you––what I––” He exhaled sharply through his teeth, frustrated at finding himself at a loss for words even just briefly.

“What you want from us, and us from you?” Pepper suggested.

Loki gave a huff at the simplicity of that summary, but nodded in grudging agreement, and added, “I would be a greater fool than any of the many ridiculously idiotic creatures I have met in my long life to ignore my _own self’s_ words and experiences, however bizarrely second-hand, and not try to learn from it. I do not understand how the things he experienced came to be, nor how having them made him whole, such that the loss turned him into the person we just met.”

“But you and I... you and the Avengers, we’re... kinda-” Tony started to gesture between the two of them to indicate enmity.

“Not any longer.”

“Just like that?” The inventor was still lost in his own incredulity.

“Apparently, one day in the future, without this meddling from outside our timeline, there was a high likelihood of the both of you coming to mean everything to me,” Loki said blithely. “Having heard this from my own lips, I cannot doubt it. I know how I lie. That was no lie, and all full of desperation besides. The pain on his face when he looked at you both will _haunt me_ for quite some time. I do not think I could remain your enemy if I _tried_ , Stark.”

Tony swallowed tightly, unsure quite how to handle that, or the hint of something between disbelief, self-loathing and confusion clear in the god’s expression, where his composure cracked despite how mocking and steady his voice had sounded. It occurred to Tony that he was looking at a man who had just watched himself die and tucked the corpse up his own sleeve. Admittedly, that was a bit more trauma than the inventor could say that he himself had quite dealt with this month (outside of some old nightmares) even despite being an Avenger, and that maybe the cool and aloof way the mage had handled it was more of front than Loki had cared to let on. “Sorry. You almost had me thinking you were okay, after that.”

“I’m an even more accomplished faker than you are, you really should recall,” Loki countered, his smile chill and lightly shattered as he let his head fall back and pushed his again-empty glass Tony’s way.

A bit belatedly, the inventor realized more than half the bottle had been drained by the trickster in a relatively short period of time. He refilled it nevertheless, interested to see if the god might relax further still. There was only so far they would get with the Cancer-verse that night, given how much time they had to work on it and all of the other things weighing on all three of their minds. “I think we’d like that promise, then.”

“Then you have it,” Loki murmured.

Pepper appeared concerned, but also similarly curious, watching the trickster accept another glass of scotch. “So what do you want to know, Loki?”

The god tilted his head enough to meet her eye. “I’m a mage. In my culture, that’s basically synonymous with ‘one whose curiosity is insatiable’ so really, begin anywhere, and we will eventually wind up where we need to be. That is how conversation generally works.”

She smiled a bit. “Is this your attempt at charm?”

“No, this is seeking distraction from unpleasant and deeply disturbing thoughts about my own mortality and broken mind, while tipsy and talking to attractive people and simultaneously trying to forget that I just watched my own deathbed confession of love for you both,” Loki countered coolly, but his smile was light and charming.

Pepper shook her head at him, smiling sadly. “He was in a lot of pain.”

“The pain didn’t bother him any longer. He felt that he deserved it,” Loki said.

“Are you that way?” she asked.

“On the occasions that I feel guilt, yes, few and far between as those are.”

Pepper leaned over the table, resting her chin on one hand as she observed him, observing her. “When did you last feel that?”

Loki grimaced, but didn’t look like he planned to evade the question, though he did mull it over for nearly a full minute. “I went to Jotunnheim, and saw what damage the bi-frost had done to it, several months ago.” He swallowed thickly. “I had been able to face every other aspect of that atrocity I had committed, and been very aware of how very little mercy I deserve given what I have done––except the smallest of factors I had not allowed myself to consider.” He held up a hand, forefinger and thumb an inch apart.

Tony saw his expression and knew with disturbing clarity where this was going. Images from Gulmira flashed through his mind. _Small details_. A child’s doll stained with blood was, after all a small detail. “Children,” he said quietly.

Loki’s eyes snapped over to him with a mixture of fear and guilt and deep resentment until it sunk in, suddenly, how the inventor had guessed, and how Tony’s expression was one of acute understanding and commiseration, rather than accusation or loathing. The god’s jaw dropped slightly. “You?”

“I wasn’t called the ‘Merchant of Death’ for nothin’, sweetheart,” Tony sighed. “Want to compare death-counts? Mine is only as exact as JARVIS can manage.”

“If you like, I can ask my daughter for a more precise count,” the god mused.

The inventor gave it serious thought, and drained his drink quickly. “Maybe.”

“It’s not healthy for either of you to really dwell on,” Pepper chided lightly. “You deserve to carry the regrets you have, but wallowing in them doesn’t serve any more purpose than self-flagellation. You’re both capable of doing much more useful things than hating and hurting yourselves for the sake of people who are dead, when you could instead be helping those among the living you might happen to care about.”

Both men stared at her for a moment.

“I’ve told you this before, Tony.”

“Not quite so bluntly. I dig it,” the inventor mused.

“That’s because you aren’t the sole target, and it makes it easier for you to maintain composure when she’s not only looking at you,” Loki mused, and caught Pepper’s eye, seeing a glitter of interest and approval, like she was curious as to what other insights he might have. It made his chest feel a bit lighter than it had a moment before, and the sensation increased a little when Tony’s fingers brushed his own where the inventor tugged away his glass to refill it again.

The trickster looked over the other man, not for the first time, from head-to-toe, albeit with a little more open appreciation than in past. Tony was pouring, and didn’t notice, but Pepper did, and Loki glimpsed her looking from the corner of his eye. Looking her way again, he smirked just a little, and eyed her as well, and smiled a bit wider when she blushed prettily in response.

Tony placed Loki’s drink back in his hand and noticed his girlfriend a little flushed and the trickster’s smile more than a little lascivious, and wondered if he’d missed something, until the god turned it on him too and...

Damn. That was a little unfairly dazzling. Really unfair.

After a second or two, the inventor realized he was staring, and that his mouth was suddenly a bit dry. Rather than break eye contact, he lifted his own drink to his lips and arched an eyebrow slowly, a little challenging. Loki started to match the gesture, only for his glass to be abruptly plucked away, throwing off the staring contest as both men fixed their attention back on Pepper as she took a long, slow sip of the god’s drink before casually handing it back, tongue darting across her lower lip quickly.

Loki accepted it, with a nod, and took a small sip of his own.

“So it’s clear you find observational skills a turn-on,” Tony mused lightly. “Anything else?”

“Tony!” Pepper scolded, blushing fiercely again.

The trickster only chuckled a little. “Where would be the challenge if I told you right away, Tony?”

It occurred to the inventor, briefly, that while the other Loki had called him _Tony_ , consistently, this was the first time this one had, without also including his surname. _Interesting_. “You could have us work out why we think it turns you on,” he suggested.

Loki’s expression turned pure mischief then. “Interesting, but perhaps we make it still more so.”

“Oh?” Tony asked.

“I guess what turns one of you on. If the other of you can correctly determine whether it is true, I forfeit a ‘turn-on’ of my own. Whichever of you makes the best analysis, I make my next target,” Loki extrapolated, grinning.

The inventor shot Pepper a questioning look.

She returned it, looking interested. Very interested.

Tony felt his breath catch for a second.

“Female dominance,” Loki guessed, “Tony.”

“Accurate,” Pepper assured, smiling very sharp and pretty.

Loki himself stared at her very intently then, before recalling that he needed confirmation from the mad inventor, and glancing his way too.

“Spot on,” Tony admitted.

The trickster gestured toward the lovely CEO in a welcoming manner, indicating she should guess first. “Having my partner on his knees,” he offered.

Pepper, pouring herself a drink of her own other than scotch now, eyed him shrewdly for a few moments. “I assume that’s admitting you prefer your female partners to be more in control than your male partners, given the segue,” she started. “I can see that, given you most likely spent a lot of time in Asgard proving the point that brute strength is just one tool to choose, not any sort of virtue which puts another warrior above all the rest. You have brute strength, under it all, but you don’t need it most of the time, and you prefer to let people forget about it until such an occasion that it comes in handy.” She smiled at his increasingly rapt attention. Appealing to his vanity was fun, she found. “You like having a powerful male partner on his knees for your use because you appreciate the message it sends, you being who and what you are, having full control over proceedings because you probably brought them there by persuasion, made them want to kneel, and they knelt because of your words and the force of your ideas, not physical force.”

She swirled her drink a bit, sitting back in her seat. “By contrast, you probably admire powerful women because they are generally perceived to be at an automatic brute-force disadvantage in the society you were raised in, and so their ability to bring you low makes you desperate to please them, because you feel more like you’ve been out-played on your own terms, by your own rules, rather than the patriarchal ones you find less refined and respectable. You also love a show of feminine strength and power that bends you to a woman’s will, because you perversely enjoy the evidence that you can still be laid low utterly by the so-called ‘weaker’ or ‘feminine’ traits which you’ve been often accused of possessing yourself. You feel lowered and inferior, and yet vindicated and valued in a way that rejects masculinity as ideal and holds up feminine power as something you do deeply venerate, when you’re brought low at the hands of a woman,” she concluded, low and thoughtful. “And that gets you off.”

Loki was staring at her steadily all the while, an she was able to watch his throat working in response to her words, like he was trying to swallow them down as they left her lips. He dragged his teeth visibly across his lower lip and eventually managed to pry his eyes from her to set them on Tony, who also seemed to be ensnared by her words and perhaps breathing a little less evenly.

Recovering himself quickly, the inventor cleared his throat and offered, “I don’t think I can follow that. She said almost everything.”

“Do you cede, then?” the trickster inquired.

“Well, yeah. I mean... I can’t disagree with her at all, but I do think I’ll add that you like to maneuver people into wanting what you want. You like it when you someone on their knees who shouldn’t kneel to you, per general cultural expectation, let alone be inclined to beg for your cock in their mouth, but you enjoy twisting them into wanting that, and making them ask for it. The idea of them on their knees is prelude to how you can make them appreciate it, and want more of what you want. You don’t like, as much, the idea of a guy having you in a similar position without them having earned it, and won the game by your terms instead of pure physical force, but I get the feeling that when you’ve put yourself in that position, because you know exactly how to make someone want to be there, that’s mostly _because_ you know what you would want, in the same situation and pose,” he offered. “It’s rarer, I’d guess, but you’d get on your knees for the right people, and let them have their way, because you wanted them to.”

Loki tugged his lower lip into his mouth, admiring them both openly for a moment, “Oh, very good; still, really I must hand it to you, Pepper, for the sheer number of accurate insights.” He looked her over slowly then, head-to-toe, eyes traveling almost lazily up. “I think you enjoy being pinned up against a wall and all of your clothing made messy due to haste and enthusiasm, but you dislike lingering marks above your collar.”

Pepper coughed, blushing deeply again.

“Accurate,” Tony mused.

She nodded, staring at Loki a little more warily. “How did you... ?”

He only grinned wickedly and offered Tony, “Being ridden hard while also partially restrained.”

The inventor tried not to think about Pepper restraining the god’s wrists while Tony himself rode Loki’s cock like he meant to fuck the trickster through the mattress. He did not entirely succeed and might have stared for a few too-long seconds before glancing briefly down toward Loki’s hips and then meeting the trickster’s gaze again as he took another sip of his drink. “You like being the giving party well enough, but you also want to feel used, to an extent. Also you probably get off on watching your partner get themselves off with little or no effort from you, just their own enthusiasm in taking what you have to give without letting you fully control how fast or how hard. You can contribute in smaller ways, in that position, because you’re probably flexible and I know you’re damn strong, but the struggle required to do so gets you worked up, as does the surprise and positive reactions your efforts earn you, from the one riding you.” When he glanced at Pepper, he noticed that her blush now encompassed not only her face but the back of her neck, across her collarbones, and below the neckline of her blouse.

She took a hasty sip of her martini before speaking. “You like how much effort you have to go to, to have any control in that context. It’s worth more to you, having to struggle, but also still showing a willingness to stay restrained, given how skilled you are at escaping restraints in general. You like handing over that much control while still being the main source of your partner’s pleasure, as well as getting to see all of their reactions, and how they prefer to be taken, which you doubtlessly will use against them later to get them off all the harder, when you’re not so restrained.”

Loki inclined his head toward Tony in concession and guessed, “Long legs.” He stretched his own out visibly, crossed at the ankle.

The inventor let his eyes wander over them with a slightly hungry look.

“Yes,” Pepper answered.

Tony nodded quickly.

“Is it more that you enjoy the feeling of them wrapped around you, or that they fit nicely between your own legs, alongside them or even folded under you slightly, as you’re being fucked?” Loki inquired in cool, almost dulcet tones.

The inventor was not immediately coherent enough to respond to that.

Before the trickster could say another word, a series of alarms began going off.

The household AI chimed in: “Potentially aggressive energy disturbance detected. It would seem to be magic, not unlike Mr. Lie-smith’s own.”

Loki’s eyes glowed briefly as he apparently felt it like a sharp impact against his own chin. He frowned slightly and rubbed at one side of his face like perhaps it had gone a little numb. “No need to panic, yet. That is a persistent searching spell. My daughter is looking for me..”

“It behaved rather like a projectile on all scans,” JARVIS commented.

“Consider it like a cross between a tracking hound and a heat-seeking missile,” the god explained. “She only uses it when she needs to find me quickly, and with intent to transport herself to my location with haste, so I’m presuming this is about to become an urgent matter.”

“How urgent?” Pepper asked.

The air immediately behind Loki coalesced in shades of blue, black, green and purple like a bruise, then as it began to glow, more like the oily sheen on raven-feathers. From the cloud erupted an irate goddess of death, with one dark green eye on her paler side, with skin pale as her father’s warmer form and auburn-gold hair, and pale grey eye in the midst of blackened sclera on her darker side, with skin darker than her father’s Jotunn-blue flesh and densely covered in thin, black and swirling markings as natural as woodgrain or tiger-stripes. She pressed a dagger to Loki’s throat and yanked his head back by his hair. “What have you _done_ , father?!” She was all in armor of black with embroidery that gleamed opalescent in feather patterns, with metal of polished slate-grey, like it might be polished stone as easily as metal, for its texture.

Pepper and Tony stared, unable to move, or determine, based on the adoring smile the trickster beamed up at Hel with, letting his head loll back limply in her grasp, whether Loki was in any genuine danger or not. They exchanged worried looks only briefly.

“My darling, I have done nothing tonight altogether willingly within the past several hours, save for the things I have done deliberately unwisely and with reckless haste, of which there have been perhaps a dozen. You will _really_ need to _specify_ ,” the trickster chided, sounding very much like a doting parent despite the potential lethality of his position at his daughter’s hands.

She made a noise like an annoyed growl. “There is a soul trapped up your sleeve. I don’t know to whom it must belong, but creatures from beyond the boundaries of this universe are even now wreaking merry havoc throughout my kingdom seeking it out. You will explain, father dear. _Immediately_.”

Loki winced, sudden grim realization dawning in his expression. “The fool, the fool, the _bloody fool_ ,” he snarled. “He bound his soul to his blood, or some object about his person; either way, it must be part of how he contained that plague in his system, I have little doubt.”

“You still aren’t making sense, father.”

“We have a body to burn, with a narrower time-table to make the arrangements than I anticipated. Spells like that one only last for so long after the caster’s death,” the trickster said quickly, eyes dark and calculative, and just a little afraid. “This will require a trip to Asgard and any funeral barge you might spare for one of me, also immediately.”

Hel hesitated. “What do you mean ‘one of you’, father?”

“From an alternate timeline,” Pepper supplied.

“He did a lot of inter-universe hopping, actually,” Tony added. “Apparently, he pissed off some folks, by the sound of it.”

“Perpetually,” Hel sighed, rolling her eyes; although she removed her dagger and her restraining hands from Loki’s person, sheathing the weapon and stepping back while also pulling her father’s chair away from the work table. “Come, father. Let’s send your duplicate to his rest. I’m honestly shocked this has only happened once before.”

“This has happened before?” Loki asked sharply.

“Well... he was just passing through.” She blinked at him. “What? A lot of things happen in the land of the dead, like that. We’re an in-between place. Do not even dare ask what the strangest events I’ve seen there have been if it takes only _this_ to so disturb you,” she teased a little, but her half-smile was still more sympathetic than mocking as she took her father’s arm. Only then did it seem to occur to her to look at the two humans in the room and wonder why her father had been occupied with them, especially given the very distinct smell of alcohol on Loki’s breath. “Whatever I’ve interrupted, if it’s being left unfinished, he’ll return to when we are finished.”

“He’d better,” Pepper said, then covered her own mouth with one hand, looking deeply embarrassed.

The trickster grinned a little despite himself in response. “I will return,” he assured, before he vanished within opalescent purple-black fog along with his daughter.

Both the CEO and her mad inventor finished the remainder of their drinks in one swallow almost immediately after the gods vanished.

“What exactly are we doing?” Tony asked, a little hesitantly.

“I don’t know,” Pepper responded, a little fearfully, “but I really kind of want to find out? Is that bad?”

“I wouldn’t say so, frankly,” the engineer muttered, “but I’m the one with all of the bad ideas. Pepper, I love you, and you’re my rock and my moral compass: please help me out, here.”

She took a slow, deep breath, then let it out only a bit shakily. “Okay... let’s sort of, outline what we know here. His... Traveler-self.” She looked at Tony for a moment, then stood up and strode over to take his head in her hands, stroking his hair soothingly enough that his eyelids drooped, then fell shut. “He loved us. We couldn’t have been prepared for how much.”

“He loved other versions of us,” the inventor murmured.

“Over a hundred little variations, and he never wavered,” she countered.

“And never stayed.”

“He couldn’t have. Even if there were universes where his other self died... if another one of me had come through, and you lost me-”

“Don’t-”

“Think about it,” she said quietly.

“I... see your point.” It was deeply uncomfortable and he was sure an entire cosmic-horror romantic-comedy could be made out of the very concept, but it hit him wrong. “There would be guilt and, with him at least, some suspicion he’d arranged it as a takeover somehow.”

“He respected us enough that he didn’t do that.”

Tony swallowed thickly, leaning forward until his brow rested against her collarbone. “Loki here, the one in our universe, isn’t him.”

“No... they’re different, but only in happenstance, I think,” Pepper murmured. “Their universes had a few different situations here and there, but overall the content of their character seemed the same, if that makes sense.”

“It does,” the engineer admitted. “That doesn’t make me more inclined to share you.” He peered up at her. “Do you...” He hesitated.

“Tony, if you hadn’t known that, in the end, he would wind up meaning more to us than a casual sort of... add-on, to what we have,” the CEO said slowly, her fingers still running through his hair, “would you be interested in more casual sharing?”

Tony swallowed tightly, trying to dismiss his own desperate possessiveness enough to think clearly, with a little more distance. If there hadn’t been _feelings_ , and instead just enough interest from all sides and a little risk... “Maybe, but only if I knew he valued you enough not to hurt you, even if not in an emotional-connection sort of way.”

“You’re afraid,” she said softly.

“Aren’t you?”

“I trust you.”

At that, the inventor closed his eyes again. “I don’t deserve that much.”

“You don’t. He doesn’t, either,” Pepper mused. “I still... I trust him more than I should. It’s how he looks at me, like he isn’t sure I can possibly be real, and he disbelieves every word I say except for a few he can’t dismiss because they’re too true. It throws him off, honesty.” She kissed the top of Tony’s head gently. “You’re the same way, you know, only when I try to tell you how I love you.”

Tony huffed a warm breath, close to her chest. “You _are_ too good, Pep.”

“Better than you think you deserve, maybe, but I love you regardless,” she whispered quietly, right in his ear.

“Pep...”

“Are you afraid that you’ll be left alone?”

His hands, now at her hips, gripped a little tighter.

“I won’t give you up,” she said. “And he’s only less open about his interest in you because he’s afraid you don’t, or won’t want him as much as he wants you. I caught him looking at you more often than you did.”

Tony ran his lower lip through his teeth thoughtfully, face still mostly-hidden against Pepper. “Are you sure you want this?”

“Are you?” she asked back, genuinely concerned.

“I’ve gotten sufficiently adjusted to keeping my libido in check around people other than you that I’m actually a bit uncomfortable with how difficult he makes it, a little, but I also want to punch him in the face a bit, just on general principal,” he huffed.

“Had you been attracted to him before this?”

A few moments of conspicuous silence followed.

“Tony?” Pepper asked, a little amused, until the inventor lifted his head and she could clearly discern that his expression was one of stricken realization. “Are you okay?”

“Um. Yeah. Just puts a few dreams I’d sort of forgotten about after the whole invasion thing in a new context. At the time I found them really disconcerting, but also really hot, which was the disconcerting part, but I’d kind of just...” He gestured vaguely. “Other things happened. I had a few panic attacks and destroyed all of my armor that one time and started having more variety to my nightmares, and I’d forgotten about it.”

Pepper raised her eyebrows at him slowly. “But you never really imagined-”

“Only a few times,” Tony admitted grudgingly. “He’s sort of gorgeous and myths that have lasted over a thousand years nicknamed him ‘Silver-tongue’ and he looks like he’s barely even thirty, and did I mention legs?”

“The topic did come up, yes.”

“Plus there’s something about him that says ‘all of the best hate-sex’ to me. Very loudly. In stereo. Or, well, there was.” His brow furrowed. “There might still be, a bit, but it’s like the hate drained out of him as soon as he saw whatever his bizarro-self showed him. I don’t know how to handle him without all of his anger aimed at me, and villain façade neatly in place. I kind of want to piss him off just to get that out of the way.”

Pepper snorted. “Of course you do.” Then she looked thoughtful. “Perhaps you could both use the outlet.”

The engineer stared at her with a mixture awe, deep respect, and moderate fear that his personal anchor was losing her grip, possibly. “You’re sounding like me.”

“I think it would be ridiculous for any of us to suggest there’s not sexual tension here,” she said lightly. “I’m not immune. I have a pulse and yes, he’s gorgeous.” She did blush faintly, and dust nonexistent lint off his shirt, not looking him in the eye as she said it, even as a slightly wicked smirk tugged at the corners of her mouth. She did look at his face again as she added, “I think we need to know more about how this started, how we got to this point more naturally, maybe, before we’ll really be comfortable with it.”

“You mean our other selves.”

She nodded, pulling a few memory sticks from one pocket. “I noticed after we ate the apples, I can read the runes on these. This one has my name, and numbers, and some notation that I think is meant to indicate these were all from ‘successful’ jumps. There are a few with your name, too.”

Tony glanced at the projection device. “Well. We have a bit of time.”

 

~~

 

The first one they loaded in was from jump 97.

It started out as a blur.

“How do I... auto-focus never really means auto-focus, Loki. I’d prefer a bit more control over-”

Suddenly the hazy image of orange and green blurs snapped into the perfect image of Pepper Potts, looking like she was a bit startled to find herself there. “Oh, it’s like a booth. I like it.”

A disembodied voice, Loki-the-traveler, murmured indistinct-sounding instructions.

“That sounds creepy,” the projection muttered, then seemed to make eye contact with her audience. Both Pepper-the-not-projected and Tony stiffened a bit, and looked at each other.

“You too?” she asked.

“Fucking magic,” the inventor sighed.

They both looked back at the projection.

“Right, well, where do I even start?” said Pepper from Jump 97. “Okay, I’m only doing this because Loki was really distraught about the jump before this one. He... arrived early. I hadn’t... _we_ hadn’t gotten involved with him yet.” She made a face. “Oh, god, I promised I wouldn’t be cagey about this. Look, it was my idea. Well, I started it. We all had the idea in spades by then, to the point you could cut the sexual tension with a steak knife whenever Loki was around either of us, or both of us, especially both.” Her smile had a hint of playful mirth in it, for a moment. “He had started to practically live in the tower for about a month, after all of his magic was drained fighting off Doom. Yes, he fought off Doom. I was not the damsel, though, Tony was, and Loki helped me get him back.” She cleared her throat. “You’re probably watching this with him. Oh, this is so awkward, what if I’m wrong and I try to address him, but I just-”

More soothing, distorted words from off-camera.

“Right. Okay. So... okay. Our Loki lied to me, at first: ha ha, no one is surprised.” She chuckled at something disgruntled the nearby god said, which again was distorted and picked up properly by the recording. “Ignore him. Look, I get it. He wanted to mess with the Avengers and Thor, and avoid S.H.I.E.L.D., so being around me as my personal assistant was really convenient. He used a persona... Lora Smith. Yes, a woman. And ask him to show you that form sometime, because she’s _delicious_ , but that’s not the point.”

She leaned forward a little, tucking her knees up slightly to rest her folded arms on them. “We gained more of a rapport than I think Loki expected. We teased each other, played off of each other in meetings to manipulate them all the more smoothly and scare people a little, almost like we had been working together for years. Tony, you’re great, but it’s never a duet, in a board meeting with you. Lora was something else. With our powers combined, we even scared Natasha a little bit.” Her pride, full of mischief as it was, was warm and open. “Officially, Lora is still on the payroll. She even has a passport, a believable background and paper trail almost like she’s really an earthling. It just... works. We work, together.” A shrug. “Loki enjoys playing games with people and odds, and really Stark Industries has more resources to play with than most _countries_ , and he really knows what he’s talking about in financial as well as technical aspects.” She cleared her throat. “I’m... sorry you won’t get that chance, unless maybe you show him this, too, sometime. You wouldn’t trust him with that, right away. Especially if this is before I’ve... before you even met him, really. I remember being where you are now, and if anyone had tried to tell me that I’d be sharing myself, and Tony, with a trickster god and former super-villain, I’d have been too outright confused and a little off-put to even think it was a half-decent joke. It would’ve just been too weird, I know.”

Then Pepper-from-jump-97 shrugged, leaning back again and folding her arms across her chest as she smiled a helplessly happy smile, shameless even as she blushed. “But I love both of my men.” She tucked a few stray strands of hair behind her ear. “I’m trying to think back to how it started, but there’s been so much, just in these past two years. He’s saved our lives so many times, and we’ve saved his, and it’s almost hard to remember a time that was still a shock, but I do.” She sobered a little. “I remember times I was half-gone and hurt somewhere dark, and looked up and he was standing over me bloody and I wondered if it was him I needed to be afraid of, but every time he just picked me up and took me, or us, home. I can’t imagine home being as happy as it is for us all, without him.” She shook her head a little.

“Lora’s façade didn’t last meeting Thor. He recognized her, called her out, and they nearly destroyed my office,” the projection continued. “I was hurt, and a little betrayed, but goddamn did I miss her, once she was gone. So much of what we had, I’d realized, was really just the two of us having fun. His agenda to keep aware of Avengers business had become almost a side-note after the first few weeks. He stopped showing up every week, as Amora calmed down too and he continued... being Lora, with me.”

She shuffled her feet back and forth a little. “And, apparently, making questionable magic and science exchanges with Tony on the DL, but I didn’t know that until I found the walls bleeding in the kitchen a few weeks later. Real blood, I’m not joking. It was O Negative, and Loki still refuses to explain exactly where it came from, and looks really apologetic anytime I ask.” She clicked her tongue. “He had gotten a bit caught up in how amusing he thought it might be to help Tony perfect a perpetual motion device, and accidentally... well, something from another dimension apparently manifested in the lab. It was a mess, but watching Loki stick around to take care of it, and catching his attention before he could leave, we had a talk. I... invited Lora back, and told him to clean up the blood in the kitchen. He did clean it up, while I cleaned a few cuts on Tony’s face.”

Tony chuckled a bit, despite himself.

“The Lora thing... did piss Tony off. There was a fight had about that, as I’m sure you can imagine, and I’m amazed that it didn’t do more property damage, but I think he really didn’t expect me to defend Loki. I did, though. Lora was one of the best business partners I’d ever worked with, when it came to making people more cooperative, and making sure they left with precisely the right impression, even if it was a carefully incorrect one.” She smiled a little more fiercely at that.

“That was it, really. I occasionally asked him about why he did certain things, and he, as Lora, continued to be vague and prone to some selective omission, but otherwise mostly sincere. Loki still occasionally screwed with Thor, and property damage usually resulted, but not many civilians got injured. A few of them had some very bizarre stories to tell, particularly in the city block wherein Loki turned everything made of metal or stone into candy for a day. It wore off, but that was a surprisingly horrific day. It was summer, for fuck’s sake!” She threw her hands in the air in dramatic exasperation. “But then, when things really went down, he was either off on one of his own projects notably, rather than twisting the knife by using other villains against Thor like he’d used to, or he was... very subtly helping. Then, not so subtly, when it came to us.”

“That was about when the sexual tension became really deeply distracting, and that brings us back to Doom, and Loki saving us from Doom. Well, Loki and I saving Tony.” She cleared her throat. “He couldn’t leave the tower, for a long while. He took a lot of damage, and used the last of his magic to get us the fuck out of dodge, and then sort of collapsed in a bloody heap of unconscious and really heavily armored god in the middle of Tony’s lab. We brought Bruce in, and made sure he would recover. Mostly he just needed rest, but when Loki ‘ _really needs rest_ -” She emphasized with air-quotes. “-that basically means he’s in a coma for like a week, and I just... I realized he loved us. It was terrifyingly obvious, once I finally caught on, that he was all but openly courting us and we hadn’t even considered it. Well, Tony might have, but he thought I wouldn’t––and I thought he would be jealous and hurt and maybe scared––and then Loki was there, in our house, looking like the physical embodiment of resigned self-deprecation whenever we tried to talk to him.”

Pepper-from-jump-97 rubbed her hands together almost nervously. “Tony thought he was angry, at first, but he just looked... hurt, to me. I think he felt like he’d shown his hand to people who had been knowingly rejecting him and was embarrassed, and after about two weeks of hints of that breaking through his composure more and more often, I sort of––pushed him back against the kitchen counter one night and kissed him until we both forgot which way was up and that Tony was leaning against the counter next to him at the time, until Tony sort of cleared his throat and we broke apart and he grabbed Loki by the hair and... it was good. To watch.” She had a slightly distant look in her eyes for a moment, then cleared her throat. “Sorry, that was way more detail than you probably needed. Or maybe you did need it. Look, just.” She covered her face with one hand.

“Wow, I sound like a brochure. Visit this great... look, okay, I don’t know your Loki. Well... the Loki from wherever you are. I don’t even really know you. I mean, you’re probably me. Or Tony. Just... a little different. Maybe longer hair. Maybe a different... no I can’t picture Tony without some kind of distinctive beard. I really can’t. I’ve seen him clean-shaven and I still just... it’s like it never happened, you know? Like imagining Loki being blond or something. It just isn’t even a thing.” She waved a hand vaguely. “You’ll have met this... other Loki, the traveling one, by now, if you’re seeing this. He’s not ours. He...” Her eyes turned very sorrowful suddenly. “I thought I had lost them, all of my family, about a month after he showed up. I did, for a while, there. I thought the other Loki was gone too, and I just... I can’t even imagine what that’s been like for him, for this long. I don’t know if seeing us even really helps anymore, not when he can’t...”

She shook her head, biting her lip for a moment. “This isn’t fate. You won’t be drawn to him in the same ways that we were, your story is going to be completely different than mine was. Him arriving will do that. Traveler-boy.” She jerked her head in what was, presumably, Loki-the-traveler’s direction. “You’ll think I’m crazy. Shit, I still think I’m crazy, but I’m sort of so happy I don’t care, and if anyone tried to take any of my family away from me, I’d make them sorry,” she said, low and serious. “I _have_ made them sorry. Odin has _personally apologized to me_ for some of his bullshit, I’m serious.”

She stared at them, at the recording device perhaps, for a few long moments. “I don’t know what Loki was really like, any of them, before I had already become friends with him, in a strange and twisted sort of way. I know he was very different, when he invaded New York, and he was even more drastically changed out of sheer necessity by pretending to be Odin for years, and repairing his pride while wounding that old bastard’s at the same time, and really sort of mellowing out on the ‘need to rule’ front because it really did bore him, after a while.”

The projected Pepper touched one knuckle to her lips, just briefly, thinking her conclusion through for a few moments. “He’s not the way you might remember him, if you haven’t really gotten to know him yet. Just, keep that in mind. And see about hiring him on, if you can, as you personal assistant, Pepper. I’m not even joking, you really won’t regret that, even if...” She hesitated. “Even if you don’t want him, like I did. Like I _do_. Like _we do_. He’s a good friend, an excellent lover, and I sound like a brochure again.” She sighed, hand covering her face. “I don’t know if I can help that. I love my Loki. I love him very much.” Her expression softened a bit at that, and she blushed further, rubbing her hand along the back of her neck. “I love Tony too. They love each other, and they get along like a house on fire. No, really, you two, if you’re listening Tony, have almost set this tower on fire _one-hundred and eight times_ , since he started showing up here. JARVIS counted for me. Stop with the combustion, just for like, a week or two, every month? Devote some time to... things that don’t either explode or cause dimensional rifts in the basement. Surely there are _some_ things!”

Pepper the not-projection giggled a little.

“So... do what you will, but that’s my story,” said Pepper from Jump 97. “Make sure yours is a good one, too. That’s all any of us can do, Pep.” She waved a bit, then reached forward, and the recording stopped.

A long silence followed. Over four minutes of it. They couldn’t look at each other.

“You did one too,” the CEO pointed out quietly.

“Hand it over,” Tony said, a bit too quickly, and almost leapt to his feet to put it into the projector.

Tony’s recording started sharply, one of his hands vanishing into the air over his head, which apparently was how the original recording device recorded when someone had their hand right on top of it. Projection-Tony’s arm lowered, his hand appearing in view. He glanced around himself and whistled low. “Nice. I dig it. Okay.” He focused on his audience. “He’s not around, for mine. He may not actually know I’m recording this, but he mentioned the idea to Pepper, and you know, I like the idea. I watched some of hers. You’d better watch hers first, if you want me to make sense.” He waved a hand, and gave them a minute or so to possibly change out the memory sticks. “I’m going to assume you’ve seen it, then. I’m also going to tell you to stop panicking and get your hands down Loki’s pants the first chance you get.” He grinned widely, clearly imagining his audience feeling disconcerted. Then he looked a bit thoughtful, glancing skyward.

“Well, I guess it might depend on how early we’re talking. Has he shown up in the lab and offered a deal with the devil yet? If you haven’t even got that far, I have to wonder when you snagged him. Did the throne thing in Asgard get interrupted? Shit, that’d be awkward. Seriously awkward. Having two of him around to bicker with each other is bad enough here, when they at least have the same intense focus on the rest of us that makes them have to get along.” He tilted his head, like he was offering a trade secret, and added, “Loki really can’t stand a copy of himself that isn’t obedient to his whim, you know. It’s hilarious, a bit, when he almost forgets Traveler-boy isn’t one of his clones: like he wants to start ordering his other self around like a disobedient house-elf, then abruptly remembers ‘Oh yeah, that one isn’t one of mine.’ It’s ridiculous.” His smile was fond.

Then he sighed, leaning back in his seat and rubbing his chin. “So... your enemy turns out to want to be friends, and also be really hot. I really don’t envy you the awkwardness of finding out about the family, if they let that slip. I’d be surprised if you resisted the urge to run from the room screaming, my dear self. Let’s face it, if you’re me, and I’m going to assume you are, because I’ve seen a few of these recordings, and yeah, they’re all still me to the point of being eerie and a bit discomfiting. I like to be my own unique snowflake, but there’s dozens of us fuckers, if you take into account the whole multi-verse, but each universe still only gets one of us at a time, which is actually pretty good.” He gestured toward his unseen audience. “So, you’re me. You find out that Loki, this fucker you’ve really kind of enjoyed hating, and had occasional thoughts about because Clint once asked you, ‘if you had to fuck any of our enemies, who would it be?’ one night and you immediately thought of his legs, and his throat, and his voice telling you that you crave his subjugation, and you had a sort of epiphany that it would be the absolute best hate-sex ever...” He cleared his throat.

Pepper shot the real Tony a sidelong look.

He shrugged and muttered, “I’d forgotten about Clint starting it, but yeah, okay: accuracy achieved.”

“Anyway,” continued the recording, “you find out that in the future, if not for this meddling, it would’ve been 90-98% likely for Loki to fall in love with you and sort of almost die for you a few times, one occasion thinking you didn’t even like him as much as he desperately wished he could have from you...” He hesitated. “Look, don’t lead him on. Don’t. I saw what that did to him when we weren’t even doing it on purpose and it was like he was hollowed out. I couldn’t even figure out why until Pepper sort of took over.” He sighed. “I thought, you know, given we don’t...” He gestured vaguely. “Possessiveness, with bed, it wasn’t really a thing, for a long damn time. Jealousy, over that, not a thing, except with Pepper, because she’s everything.” He froze. “Oh god, she’s watching this with you, isn’t she? Oh, dude, I’m sorry.”

Pepper cracked up. Tony tried to stop her by pawing at her arms and pleading a little, as the projection went on, “Shit. Hang on. Trying to recalculate the angle of approach, here.”

“Pep, stoppit, c’mon, it’s not that funny.”

“It’s fucking hilarious, you’re adorable!”

“I am not!”

“Shh, you’re starting again.”

Tony made a reluctant noise, but went back to paying attention.

“Actually, I guess...” He made a face. “Look, I thought I’d be jealous. I _was_ jealous of Lora, once I’d seen those two in business meetings. They’re terrifying and I wanted them, but I didn’t want her touching Pepper because there was something between them... I think she might’ve already had Loki by then, but he would’ve never admitted it. He still probably wouldn’t admit it, but in retrospect: hook, line and sinker, she had him.” A half-wistful smile tugged at his lips. “You should’ve seen it. It was so obvious how much Lora wanted to please her and make her happy, and _from Lora_ that made me bristle a bit. I think it was because she made a point of seeming utterly disinterested in me––not playfully, like Natasha, but just genuinely clinical, like it didn’t even register that I’m _me_ , and attractive and kind of important to Pepper.” He scoffed and shook his head. “In retrospect, that was probably so I wouldn’t try to be friendly with her like I am with most of Pepper’s staff, because more Loki would’ve come out, if she’d started the banter and been a bit less closed-off and aloof.” He shrugged. “So Lora bothered me. And then I found out Lora was Loki, and I sort of almost had an aneurism, because Loki was supposed to keep away from people close to me, and Pepper has always been protection priority _numero uno_. I felt threatened, I felt territorial, I felt a little betrayed and I really wanted to kill him.”

Tony-from-jump-97 leaned forward, resting one arm on his knee, gesturing a bit with the other as he spoke. “I tried to start a fight, and Pepper stepped in, and I had no idea how to react. She had dug her heels in, and put herself between me and him, and told me to knock it the fuck off. She had already invited Lora back, apparently, and they had some kind of understanding, and Loki looked at her like she had spontaneously grown a second head and begun singing an operatic duet in Italian all of a sudden. He was stunned and also a bit like... Damn it, he was so disbelieving, that she liked him and trusted him that much, that it was like she’d cracked him open a little without even really trying.”

After staring into the distance for a moment, the projection half-smiled. “I realized he wanted to be around Pepper because she’s Pepper, and the way he’d acted, as Lora, was all him, for Pepper and for himself. It wasn’t easy, and I still didn’t fully trust it, but it... I’d been getting to know Loki, too. I’d really started to like the crazy fucker, and he’s brilliant in the lab. You can learn a lot from him, my friends. I’m just saying. Just, you know... You’d better not kick him out before you start some fresh scans. Think on it: magic that’s _cooperative and way more badass than Doctor Strange-love’s, Tony_. Get on that, I’m serious. Do that. Now.” He gestured. “Or, well, not now.”

He straightened up. “Look, with Loki... He’s a bastard, but you are too. You and I both know how much we need Pepper to keep human, and keep us alive and not numb from all of the... the bullshit, but also our own heads. I... I need Loki to _fly_ , like I’ve never flown before,” he confessed quietly. “I do. What you do for my heart, Pepper, he does for my brain. And then the two of you...”

The projected Tony leaned back heavily in his chair. “Pep, he gets you in ways I can’t. He plays people as well as you do, and loves getting away with shit in fine print like the diabolical mastermind he is, but you love that, too. You love how he makes you shine, and terrifies people who annoy you that you can’t otherwise banish, and how he catches on to your moods and cuddles with you on the couch in the form of an oversized wolf, because he knows how tactile you are when you need reassurance, and that you like pets but are allergic to most of them but never him, and that him being big and strong but basically an oversized puppy somehow makes you feel protected and comfortably in control at the same time.” He cleared his throat more quietly. “He’s good for me. For us both. And we’re good for him. We fuck up, we fight, misunderstandings are had––especially the first time you really meet Amora, Pep, and it turns out she has no concept of personal space, but I promise you, she’s like the annoying little sister he never had, and that’s the only reason he dotes on her a bit. Seriously, please, do not threaten her with any armor.” He hesitated. “It hurts my heart to say that, though. It was so hot to watch, you have no idea. I made a really embarrassing noise in front of all of the Avengers, and I’m not even a little bit sorry. Not even though Clint still won’t let me forget it.”

“Damn,” Tony-the-not-projection muttered.

Pepper snorted at him, and tried to wipe at the corner of her eye in the most surreptitious way possible, which made the inventor try really, really hard not to smile a little smugly in response.

The projection continued, “I honestly don’t know how else it could’ve worked, with us. That’s without this speed-bump you’ll have gotten. Just... don’t run from him. Or try not to. He’ll never say so, but it hurts him when people do that: either run away, or leave him behind without warning. It’s a thing, just... try not to.” He frowned a little. “Damn, that sounds sappy. Look, he’s hung as befits a god and sucks cock like he was made for it. Also, Pepper, his ‘number of orgasms from you in succession’ record still beats mine, by like five. I seriously do not understand how his tongue does what it does, but it’s amazing, and watching him use it on you remains one of the best things ever in the history of ever, second only to both of you fucking me at the same time like you both _own me_ ,” he added, as salacious as he could manage, which put his voice somewhere between breathless pleasure and roughly filthy on those last two syllables.

A small and indecent noise escaped Pepper’s throat.

Tony’s eyebrows threatened to meet his hairline. He might have blushed.

“Well, they _do_ own me,” the projection-Tony amended. “But you know what I mean, particularly.” He winked. “Give it some thought, honeys. You know I love you. And I know you, Tony Stark. You’re greedy. Embrace it.” He grinned bright and fierce and reached up over his head. The projection ended.

“Well shit,” Tony muttered.

“You’re such an ass,” Pepper groaned.

“I do love hearing that man talk,” he mused, with mock-longing, until his girlfriend aggressively ruffled his hair to make him crack up, but when the laughter subsided, he did admit: “I don’t even know how to begin to process this. I’m caught between turned on and still a little horrified,” he confessed, even after laughing helplessly for a moment.

“I think... I think I want to give him a chance, Tony,” the CEO said softly. “Just from all we’ve seen, I think I want a chance to know if he’s really like that.”

Recalling the way Loki-the-traveler had looked at her, how broken open he’d seemed, and their own universe’s Loki giving his slightly-hoarse confession, _I do not think I could remain your enemy if I_ tried _, Stark_ , Tony thought about it. He thought about the gutted and fearful look on Loki’s face after he’d opened that locket. He thought about Loki defining a mage as _one whose curiosity is insatiable_ and the feel of Loki-the-traveler’s lips on his brow, the too-restrained want in that trickster’s loose embrace, and the undercurrent of pain and affection all throughout. “I want to know,” he said quietly. “I want to know, too.”

Pepper offered him a hesitant half-smile. “You think he might...”

Tony held up another memory stick. “There’s one from him, jump 97.”

The CEO covered her mouth with one hand, considering. “Show it.”

Leaping to his feet immediately, Tony swapped out the memory sticks and was back at his girlfriend’s side within less than a second, humming with curiosity.

The projection showed them a Loki very similar to the one in their own universe, except for a scar bisecting his left brow. “Hello.” He hesitated. “I hardly know where to start, with the both of you, or myself, in this matter.” He rubbed his hands together slowly. “I am... an inherently selfish creature. I want to persuade you all to give me a chance, as my own loves have in this universe, but knowing that Pepper and Tony will have found this out without any time to get to know me, I have to wonder if that may be impossible.” His expression became one of grief, just for a moment, at that thought. “I did not get here by honest means, but you both forgave and forgive me regardless, which never ceases to astonish me. You both never cease to astonish me.”

Taking a deep breath, the trickster said, “I do not know you. We will never meet. I only know that Tony Stark and Pepper Potts, within my universe, are two forces of nature who have come to own me, body and soul, and I hardly deserve them, but they do not seem to care, and I am far too selfish not to accept what they offer me, which I have come to require as much as air. If you do not yet know me, but are hearing this now, I can only assure you, Tony, Pepper, that you have more power to harm me than you will ever know. If I have met my Traveler-self, if I have seen what he has lost, I now know that already.”

The projected trickster’s brow furrowed deeply as he considered what to tell them. “I have had two great loves before you, and married one of them, but still only had enough trust and passion to father a child with the other, before her. She did not love me, as Sigyn did, but I was deeply enamored with Angrboða. I admired her strength and her perspicacity, and would have been devoted to her always, had she but let me. Instead, we raised Hela, and parted ways as she wandered where the winds next took her, and it almost shattered my heart, not to go with her. My kin in Asgard held me back. I knew they loved me the better, and needed me the more, and so I let them, but part of me regretted that for a very long time.” He took a deep breath slowly. “With the both of _you_... we did not expect to become so close, nor was it in any way planned for us to begin a family, but we have found ourselves here, and I cannot put into words how much I love it.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Tony, I know you in particular may not wish to hear this, still knowing me only as your enemy and having such fear that you might not be enough, to raise a child, but you are stunning. I trust you with my life, both of you, and with those young lives I value far more than my own.”

Loki hesitated, then continued a little more softly, “It pains me to think of a world without them, as yours might well become, for they are not yet born there, and my self in your universe may never earn your trust. Events will unfold so differently that it is impossible to determine what your future will look like.”

“So... I will not tell you their names. I will not tell you their natures, their looks. It would be unfair, to pressure you both into pursuit of anything based on two lives who may not be fated to be, in your universe. This is not about them. This is about myself, and who I am right now, to you both.” He gestured toward them. “To Pepper, I am a stranger who once wrought havoc on her world and nearly got Tony killed. To Tony I am the enemy, and not to be trusted, and with good reason, given our list of previous interactions begins with me in a cage, followed by defenestration on the only occasion that we really spoke to each other directly, and ends with seeing me sent back to Asgard in chains and later hearing that I died saving Thor’s life.” He smiled thinly. “I like to think, Tony, that you suspected he was fooled long before he ever did.”

The inventor half-smirked at that despite himself.

“If you have sufficient curiosity about me, so far as to let me into your life enough to give me a chance, then I have little doubt that I will take it, especially once I converse with you properly, Pepper. Tony, I knew to be brilliant and fascinating from the start, but you surprised me, and continue to surprise me, by being both inexplicably pure of heart, yet still devious, and so sharp, and just twisted enough in your humor and moral practicality that somehow you still like me, and even, in this universe, come to love me.” He smiled softly. “I could never have anticipated ever meeting anyone like you, either of you, let alone being wanted by you both in return.”

His smile became one of open self-deprecation. “I will be disbelieving, I have no doubt. I will be afraid that you both will suddenly remember that I am the enemy, and as such I will not be able to hope to keep you both. In my universe, I fell for each of you quietly, but with my whole being, and believed that I could never have either of you, that I would never be let in. I... will not be in quite that position this time, given what I have surely learned from the Traveler. I will know that it is possible, if I play my cards right, to touch both of you as I might wish, if you will only let me.” He smiled a smaller, more lascivious smile. “I assure you that you will not regret letting me into your bed. Into you hearts, I cannot say. I may not be the same, in your universe, as I am here, but I believe that with the both of you, I cannot be too different. I am selfish, and I am greedy, and I might be more eager than even I realize, in your universe, to have what the Traveler has shown me to be possible. It is up to you, and myself, to discover. I wish you all well.”

The projection faded.

“I need another drink,” Tony said faintly.

“Me too.” She took his hand, leading him out of the lab and back up to the penthouse. After he made them both a couple of large martinis, hers with extra olives, she steered him to the couch and curled up with him there, cuddled against his chest as they both sipped their drinks.

“I want to try,” Pepper said softly.

“Me too.”

They looked at each other for a moment. Tony kissed her softly, and she kissed him back, and they sighed into it, gentle and calm, lingering close for a few moments after it ended.

“We’re insane,” the inventor deadpanned.

Giggling a little, the CEO shook her head. “Do we care?”

He chuckled softly. “Nah. I like it.”

 

~~

 

Loki remained off of everyone’s radar for nearly two days. Thor noticed his brother’s absence in conjunction with the nervous waiting around the two new Asgardian citizens seemed to be doing whenever he spotted them within Avengers tower, and thankfully left off the majority of his inquiries out of a suspicion they were still pending answers themselves. That, and the fact that they both appeared in good health and not obviously traumatized, was mostly sufficient to satisfy him. He merely asked Pepper, the second morning, “My brother, is he well?”

She looked up at him like she wanted to pet him for how reserved and sincerely concerned he was. “He’s... busy. With his other self.”

“I thought that he-”

The CEO raised a hand to cut him off. “Well... the body and soul in their individual parts, rather than as a coherent whole, I should say. Apparently, there’s a bit of a mess around it. Hel is involved.”

“Oh.” His brow furrowed in a different sort of concern, then: more thoughtful and strategic, perhaps. “He... Do you believe he may return?”

Pepper smiled sweetly. “He’d better.”

Uncertain quite what to make of that, Thor nodded in acknowledgement, and continued on his way.

 

~~

 

“How long does it take to burn a body, anyway?” Pepper muttered under her breath, without preamble, during dinner that night, causing Tony to choke on his food while Natasha and Bruce looked slightly worried.

“Body?” Natasha asked lightly.

Pepper’s face reddened. “Sorry. Just... it’s a really long story.”

Tony looked like he was having some conflicted thoughts and met his CEO’s eye with an unspoken question.

It was curry night, Clint was out on a S.H.I.E.L.D. mission, Steve was avoiding the embarrassment of being unable to withstand spicy food by watching movies with Thor (the excuse they used was “cultural education” which explained all of the Disney films; also some foreign films, with Thor commenting on occasional inaccuracies in the subtitles) and a lot of pizza. That left them with two of the more astute and understanding Avengers to broach a certain topic with. Seeing Pepper catch on and look hesitant, but nod in approval, Tony exhaled a slow, heavy breath. “Okay, so something really weird happened to us the other day.”

“We figured that out, yeah,” Bruce said, half-smiling at them vaguely. “You’ve both been acting a little off, like you usually do after someone almost dies.”

“It’s a bit conspicuous when no one has, and you start spending more time out of your labs and offices respectively, and just sort of talking quietly in various corners of our common rooms, like you need to be reassured by seeing us without actually asking for direct reassurance,” Natasha added.

The couple looked only a little sheepish, at that.

“It was an oddly personal delivery of urgent and vital news and information we’ll need to tell all of you, about something we’ll need to prepare for in a few years that might sort of destroy our whole universe if we don’t stop it, is all,” Pepper said lightly.

“Delivered by inter-universal traveling messenger,” Tony added. “He apparently seeks out Pep and I in any universe he lands in.” He cleared his throat. “Well, he used to. This was his last jump. He’s dead.”

“So it’s someone you both know?” inquired the assassin.

“Well... that’s where it got complicated,” the CEO sighed.

“I’d met him. She hadn’t. Where he was from, we were... important to him. A lot. Except he arrived too early and had to modify everyone’s plans, including his own... well, the ones for our universe’s version of him were modified, I mean. He’s important to the whole apocalypse-stopping thing.”

“Someone unexpected, then,” Bruce guessed.

“Very,” both Pepper and Tony agreed, with feeling.

“You don’t want to say who?” Natasha asked.

“We’re going to. Any minute now,” the CEO said quietly. “Any minute...” She opened her mouth to try and say it, then failed and elbowed Tony under the table.

“Loki! Okay? It was Loki,” he said sharply.

Both of the other Avengers looked fairly shocked by the news, at least. It was somewhat satisfying, given how habitually unflappable they both usually tended to be.

“Why... why would he go to you two?” Bruce asked hesitantly. “He’s never even met you, Pepper. Well, he hadn’t before.”

“It’s a really, really long story,” Tony said gravely. “All scans suggested it was him, or otherwise someone Jotunn with his same magic signatures; I knew that because JARVIS called him by name and asked him to drop what illusions he was wearing, which he did. After that... Well, I could see that he had some of my tech embedded in him, which apparently was helping enable his universe-hopping. Yes, _embedded_ : like in flesh and bone, like add-ons to his armor by someone who takes piercings to a disturbing extreme. He was also sort of dying, and swore he was telling the truth on every count that mattered. Thor confirmed he wouldn’t be able to break his word, given Asgard’s oath-breaking issues, which we’ve encountered a few times before.” The inventor gave a vague, dismissive gesture as though sweeping that aside. “By the way, Loki isn’t dead. The one in our universe, anyway. Thor took us to Asgard, where the other Loki sort of tore into Odin except Odin was actually our version of Loki in disguise, and whatever Traveler-Loki showed himself about the future caused him to get real cooperative, real quick. He might have cried a little.”

“He didn’t,” Pepper corrected. “He almost did, for a bit there, but don’t exaggerate.”

“And he’s... our ally now. Well, sort of. He’ll be around.” Tony cleared his throat. “He’s been playing king for three years or so, and apparently decided it was boring, so I wouldn’t worry too much about any sudden bouts of ‘taking over the world’ mania. He handed rule back over to Odin without a fight, and took us all back to the tower for more info from Traveler-Loki,” the engineer added.

“I still don’t see why he went to you two,” Natasha said flatly.

“He might have... been... uhm...” Pepper coughed. “We might, uhm.”

“We were his family, in the universe he’s from,” Tony said. “Us and two kids. Ours. He lost all of us, and didn’t take it well.”

Bruce gaped at them a little.

The assassin handled the new information a little better, her eyes wide and a little disbelieving, but her mouth snapped shut not long after it fell open, and she clenched her jaw a little, looking determined and calculative for a moment, only for it to dissolve into confusion again as she failed to work out: “How the fuck did that even happen?”

“I know, right?” the inventor exclaimed. “But it sort of... he had these recordings with him, from between the jumps, you see. We’ve watched over a dozen of them now, and a lot of them are from us, or of us. Other... other universes’ versions of both of us. A few of them are outright painfully sentimental, even, but they’re all... still _us_.” He leaned forward a little, “Look, even if somehow all of this _were_ a lie, from Loki, wouldn’t he aim for something more _believable_? This, all of this, is so fucking insane, so incredible and ridiculous and really unfairly appealing in ways that deeply disturb me, that I can’t help but believe all of it’s actually true,” Tony concluded, hands thrown in the air in a gesture of surrender to the absurdity.

“That’s a fair point,” Bruce managed, with reluctance, “but still insane.”

“Yes, none of it’s sane,” Pepper concurred.

“You... plan to date him?” Natasha asked bluntly.

“ _Both of you?_ ” the biochemist seemed a little disturbed by the idea.

“It’s consistent in every jump that the relationship there was, however improbably, always all three of us, wherever the Traveler landed. That might be in particular because with each jump he was trying to find his family everywhere that he possibly could, and save them where he had failed the first time around,” Pepper said. She then ran a hand through her hair nervously. “Neither of us are exactly conformist, but despite all sorts of fears and reservations about it, we _are_ actually interested. Yes. Both of us.”

“I knew moving in here that I could expect drama and daily doses of the unusual, but you two really take the cake sometimes,” Bruce said lightly. “I mean, I want you both to be happy, and not dead, and if he somehow isn’t still an evil little shit, well... Wait, is he still?”

“Well, he is, a bit,” Tony muttered, “more like chaotic-neutral and extremely selfish, but invested, now. He’s gotten a major shock to his system, and it sobered him up no matter how much liquor I gave him after his other self died. He’s... definitely not the same god who deliberately botched the invasion of New York in order to give the leader of the Chitauri the finger and destroy their fleet.” Tony took a long sip of his drink in the ensuing awkward silence. “By the way, I told you so.”

Natasha rolled her eyes.

“You’re sure?” Bruce insisted.

“Sworn word. He’s doing that a lot more willingly lately. It’s pretty much the only way we could believe anything either Loki was saying, y’know?” Tony said.

“Fair,” agreed the assassin. “Where is he–– _oh_ , ‘burning a body’?”

“Yeah, there are some complications. Gods, go figure,” the inventor muttered. “It sort of interrupted ‘making plans for what the fuck to do about all of this’ so he’ll be back, when he’s done with funeral arrangements and the dead.”

“Now we just need to keep Clint from trying to snipe him,” Pepper said flatly.

A murmur of low agreement rose from around the table.

“His info better be good,” Natasha said gravely.

“Well, let’s explain the Cancer-verse and you can decide,” Pepper said. “I understand you’re familiar with Mistress Death?”

The assassin paled. “You have my attention.”

Pepper covered most of the explaining, though Tony answered Bruce’s more physics-based questions about it, when she waved at him to cover them, for the sake of expediency. While she understood the overall concepts, but spoke more fluent legalese than she did the jargon of quantum mechanics.

In the end, both of the other Avengers conceded that forewarning about all of it could indeed be considered priceless to possess.

“If the others ask, he came to your penthouse because Thor was there,” Natasha supplied. “We can persuade him to go with it, and keep you both from having to explain... all of this again, though you should, to him.”

Pepper nodded. “We will. Once Loki gets his ass back here and we... figure out exactly where we all stand.”

“You think he won’t run?” Bruce asked them both, then focused on Tony and added, “Wouldn’t you, if you were him?”

“No,” Tony said.”No, I wouldn’t. If I were him? It––it’d be different, but not different enough.” He shrugged. “He’ll be back.”

Natasha shot him a curious look, at that, but seemed to understand. “Okay, then. I wish you both luck.” She half-smiled. “Admittedly, of any of our enemies past and present to have on our side, even if only for the pair of you, for it to be Loki...” A vague hand gesture followed. “He is among the ones for which I hold a little more respect than most.”

“Well, he has excellent taste,” Tony responded.

“Thank you, Natasha,” Pepper added, elbowing the inventor again, which he ignored in favor of continuing to grin shamelessly.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki returns from disposing of his own body.
> 
> Shit goes down.

The next morning, Pepper slid out of bed only an hour after dawn, huffing only a little at having to emerge from the comfort of mattress and blankets and still-sleeping mad engineer. Not bothering to put on pants, she wandered out into the main room of the penthouse wearing only a soft long-sleeved white shirt and cotton underwear, her hair a bit of a mess where it fell down her back. She yawned silently a bit, and rubbed at her eyes, then paused and squinted a bit at something on the couch that caught her eye for some reason. It was a bit unusually green.

She stepped a little closer and blinked closer to alert wakefulness in response to the strong smell of smoke in the air the nearer she got. Then she realized that the main objects draped over the back of the couch were Loki’s outer coat and some of the rest of his usual armor and outerwear. His helmet was on the coffee table. All of the ensemble was a bit charred and streaked with dark ash.

Loki himself was sprawled along the couch cushions a little further down, near the coffee table, upon which a new projector-device (more compact, less haphazard and improvised) now rested, along with over a dozen memory-sticks. Stepping a little closer, careful not to make a sound, Pepper recognized several of the memory-sticks, but about five were ones she was certain neither she nor Tony had been keeping, since the Traveler had dropped into their lives: those then were memories that would have been burned with him, had he not chosen differently near the last second.

The trickster wore his usual leather pants, now ripped and burnt in a few places at the knees and below, and a thin green undershirt half-unlaced between his collarbones and sternum. He slept like a thing dead.

Pepper contemplated for a moment whether perhaps she should feel self-conscious, but then reconsidered Loki’s own state, and all of the memories he had absorbed within such a short time, watching them unfold from those sticks, and decided not to care. Instead, she walked on cat-quiet feet toward the coffee maker.

A few minutes later, the sharp aroma of fine fresh coffee, and the low rumbling mechanical sounds from the coffee maker, caused the god of lies to stir awake slowly. He was still drained and exhausted, but he had visited Midgard with enough frequency to know that what he was smelling (even over the inescapable smell of smoke about his person) would help with that a little. He slowly lifted his head to peer over the arm of the couch, toward the bar-counter from which Tony Stark had once threatened him. He was met with the sight of Pepper Potts, tall and willowy and just a little scantily clad, reaching up to bring down three coffee mugs from one of the cabinets, the tail of her thin white sleep-shirt scarcely covering her behind.

It was, Loki admitted to himself silently, a beautiful view. _Freckles_ , his exhaustion-taxed brain provided, as one of few coherent thoughts he could quite process. He needed more sleep, he knew, and sustenance. He was not, however, inclined to stop looking, and slowly pulled himself into an upright sitting position, at which point the lady in white turned and met his eye, smiling a little, like she knew something he didn’t, and considered him also easy on the eyes.

“How do you like your coffee?”

The god blinked at her a bit blearily as he tried to recall what humans usually put in their coffee, and whether he had liked any of it. “Unaltered,” he said after a moment.

She nodded, and placed his mug on the platform, letting the machine fill it. “You look a bit singed. Are you okay?”

“I merely need rest, and sustenance, and time for my magic to recuperate,” he said, and added just a bit hesitantly, “Do you mind me doing so here?”

“I don’t. I was considering options for who I could send to hunt you down, actually, about halfway through yesterday,” she responded. “I have some questions, after all, and I know you do, too.”

“Yes,” Loki admitted, watching her fill her own cup, adding only a little milk and a little bit of cinnamon, selected from the flavor options on the overly-complex machine’s display panel.

“Which ones of ours did you watch?” she asked.

He cleared his throat. “All of them.”

Pepper turned, carrying both cups toward the couch, smiling a little. “You need more sleep by far, don’t you?”

“I believe it was nearly dawn when I succumbed, yes; however while we do have higher resistance to liquors and other chemicals, Aesir and Jotunn are both apparently susceptible to caffeine.” He accepted the mug she offered him with sincere gratitude and took a long sip, unaffected by the heat of it, though Pepper blew on hers out of habit, before taking a sip of it and sitting down next to Loki.

After a few moments in fairly comfortable quiet, the trickster asked, “What have you told the Avengers, of me?”

Cool and light, she explained, “To Natasha and Bruce, we told the truth. Thor, we plan to inform now that you’re here and we can all decide exactly what he needs to know; although I personally think he deserves the whole story as we have it.” She shot him a pointed glance and he gave a reluctant nod in response. “To the others, we plan to suggest our Traveler showed up in the penthouse because Thor happened to be there at the time, and then explain all about the cancer-verse, and see how they adjust to that before making any mention of the more personal complications.”

Loki nodded again, this time in more sincere approval. “That would simplify things considerably. Who came up with that suggestion?”

“Natasha said it first, but I think Tony and I were both already considering it.”

A low chuckle. “I do like her.”

“She did admit that she respects you more than most villains, but you didn’t hear that from me.”

For his part, the trickster only preened a little, smiling against the curve of his coffee mug on his next sip. “I’ll use my utmost discretion, Miss Potts,” he said, with the air of a seasoned politician.

“Thank you, Mr. Lie-smith,” Pepper responded, her tone crisply professional.

He met her eye with a hint of mischief in his expression, like an actor recognizing an actor for the way she has projected her voice, or a musician who has spotted another player based on the tapping of fingers against a nearby surface as though it had frets just like their instrument. He seemed pleased with this discovery. “I do believe we might get along quite well, in fact.”

“Whatever was your first clue?” she countered, grinning a little when he mock-winced at the light mockery in her tone. “You know me better now, though. At least, you’ve seen more of me.” She nodded at the memory sticks. “That... they’re all us. It’s actually a little disturbing to contemplate, but there they are.”

Loki swallowed silently. “I...” He tried to find words, and seemed to fail, his mouth snapping shut with a sharp click, as he looked down at the drink in his hands.

“Find it difficult to believe?” she asked lightly.

“I am cynical by nature,” he said. “All of the truly good things in my life have come to me only through pain and struggle, and I have had to fight tooth and nail to keep hold of them while they have been within my grasp. I find all of this... difficult to accept because it is too good, too easily. It feels like it must be some kind of trap, or otherwise doomed in some way, and the more I see of these-” He gestured toward the projection-device, and the memory sticks. “-the more I am afraid that I will never be... that only disappointment will follow. I have been set up for too many falls, where my hopes for happiness, particularly in familial matters, have been concerned.” He looked down in open surprise when Pepper rested her head on his shoulder, leaning against his side. It was... nice. He felt some tension leaving his muscles despite himself, in response to the pressure, and warmth. He focused on that––the physicality––rather than dare admit that the display of trust was more soothing than all the rest.

“You smell like a bonfire,” she said quietly, after a few moments.

“I’m... sorry.”

“It’s not bad, actually. I’m used to smelling smoke a lot, thanks to Extremis. It’s nice that it’s not me, for a change.”

Loki chuckled softly despite himself, finishing his coffee and settling the cup between both of his hands, in his lap. “I hadn’t considered that.”

“Trust me, this is pleasantly woodsy. The smell of burnt polyester-wool blends? Acrid and chemical and awful,” Pepper assured. “Very awkward, as well, in a business meeting, but at least it scared the daylights out of that representative from Hammer Industries who thought he could buy Extremis off of us.”

“That must’ve been a sight, indeed,” the trickster mused.

“Why _do_ you smell like a bonfire, exactly?” she asked.

“My ventures reached their end in Muspellheim of all places, and I had quite used up most of my reserves. I did not have enough magic left to travel between realms, and had to persuade a few local mages that it was less of a hassle to lend me enough power to leave their world sooner rather than later, than it was to deal with me for the duration of my natural recovery time.”

“You... annoyed them into lending you magic?”

“I was very persuasive. And very persistent.”

Pepper snorted at him lightly, amused. “You’re ridiculous.”

“No, of course not,” he deadpanned. “I am an aloof and powerful creature of myth, mystery and vicious elegance. In short-” He met her gaze and lowered his voice dramatically, “I am a _villain_.”

Pepper bit her lip for a moment, struggling not to laugh, only to give up swiftly when he widened his eyes a little in mock-outrage. She shook with giggles, leaning back against the couch. “Oh my god, you’re a total sham.”

“I am a liar and a trickster. Of course I am,” he countered. “Are you not?”

The CEO gestured at herself. “Everyone worth knowing tends to be.”

Loki tilted his head slightly. “Very true, yes.”

“You know too many people who disagree?” Pepper guessed.

“I’m from _Asgard_ ,” he reminded her lightly. “Have you not met Thor?”

“Oh god, are they really all like that?” She sounded scandalized.

“The righteous and painfully earnest are indeed the majority: the _honorable_ ones, with their hearts on their sleeves and their anger quick to offend, when they sense a cheat like myself,” Loki confirmed, in tones caught between disappointment and something like resentful wistfulness. It was all too clear that he had once wanted their approval desperately, and now even though he no longer did, and no longer cared, those past feelings now left a bitter taste in his mouth to recall.

“I wouldn’t survive there,” Pepper mused. “I’m usually honest enough, with people I like, but for the most part I deal with liars all day and every day. Liars, salesman, the press, lobbyists, government officials, S.H.I.E.L.D., myself and Tony Stark. I’m good, but I’m human and I’m a CEO, and all of my work is mind-games, and I’ve worked for years to maintain the positive image of a company that used to sell mostly death and luxury with small side-order of improving the human condition through medical breakthroughs and other things. Some days I almost can’t handle Thor or even Steve a bit, because they’re both just so...” She gestured vaguely. “They look at me like they see a hero, because I have a good heart and all, but they have good hearts, and that something more that’s inexplicably noble and true too, and they don’t see... they don’t see past the surface of me, and I feel almost bad that I can’t bring myself to tell them they’re wrong.”

“I know the feeling,” Loki said softly. “Even if you tried to explain, they would only try to turn each ill-colored facet into a positive, missing the nuances of selfishness or outright dismissing them.”

“I know! And they don’t see how almost insulting that is. I don’t need anyone looking at me like they’re seeing my life and flaws, and would need comfort and assurance if they had them, when I’m more than able to carry them myself without trouble.” She shook her head a little. “I got enough of that being Tony’s assistant, and before that generally maneuvering in the business world in a role people expected I was in just because I’m a woman, not perhaps because I’m damned good at it and enjoy the organization and the challenge of being an assistant to people with a tendency to dream big in ways that impressed me.” 

“It was similarly assumed of me that I pursued mage-craft primarily because I was inferior being a warrior more like Thor,” the trickster murmured.

“ _‘_ As a rule, men willingly believe that which they wish to’,” Pepper murmured; in truth, she said it in Latin, but Loki didn’t notice thanks to All-Speak.

“All too true.”

“But with those two sometimes, it’s like they make me feel bad on accident. When it’s something like them trying to make me feel better when I don’t need it, I can dismiss it. They just don’t get, but I mean, that degree of  believing there’s more good and valor in most people then there really is should seem childish, but when they aim that at me like I’m a potential fellow-soldier they would die for and trust to fight alongside them to the end... I just kind of feel small, and like I’ve done something wrong for fooling him into thinking that.” She made a face. “I don’t even _know_ how. It seems obvious to me. That’s not... I’m not a soldier, I’m not a warrior, I don’t do those things, and I’ll fight for those I love, but I do it with words and authority and organization and they just––they shouldn’t look at me like that.”

Loki was staring at her with new interest and a little commiseration. “Imagine living in close proximity to that sensation, on all sides, for over two thousand years.”

She made a face. “Okay, I see why villainy might’ve had an appeal.”

The trickster fairly crowed with laughter at that, shoulders shaking as he tossed his head back with it, caught off-guard and enchanted at the same time.

Pepper’s mouth went dry a little, because of her proximity to his bare throat, as well as how open and beautiful his face was when he laughed. She sipped her coffee, holding it with both hands in order to prevent herself reaching out to feel any and all of that under her fingers and... not her fingers.

Loki’s eyes fell open while his head was still lolled back and he paused, a some tension renewed in the line of his spine. “Hello, Stark.”

“You’re cuddling my girlfriend on my couch, and she’s not wearing pants. Call me Tony, sweetcheeks, for fuck’s sake,” the inventor shot back, his voice still a little rough from sleep. He grinned at the trickster’s slightly stunned expression, and proceeded to make a beeline for the coffee machine, intent upon caffeine.

Clearing his throat quietly, Loki glanced pointedly toward the inventor (it was a little bit of a leer, to be honest; the man was, after all, clad only in a pair of red silk boxers) and then down to meet Pepper’s gaze again, slightly questioning.

She rested her chin very deliberately on his shoulder, so their faces were very close indeed, and almost a little bit out of focus. “Stick around,” she said quietly. “We’re interested in keeping you, maybe, if you play your cards right.”

The trickster swallowed so hard his throat audibly clicked. “Oh.” He believed himself shocked then, but it was still nothing compared to a few dozen seconds later, after Pepper had again shifted to lightly rest her head on his shoulder, only to lift it sharply when Tony set a half-empty cup of coffee on the coffee table, abruptly settled his knees on either side of Loki’s thighs and caught the trickster’s mouth in a biting, aggressive kiss that was almost more fight than pleasure, but so full of heat and passionate anger that Loki returned it without thought, gripping the inventor’s hips hard enough to bruise, and pulling him down and forward sharply, all teeth and tongue and fury. He forgot entirely what he had been doing a few moments before, which way was up, and what his own name was, within thirty seconds and had Tony grinding his ass down against his erection not long after, and the slightly needy sound the inventor made at the feel of him like that made the god pull back sharply, lest he rip away the other man’s clothing and.. for some reason he shouldn’t do that yet... because... Well, surely there was some reason, if only he could remember it.

Loki blinked a bit, trying to recall what the source of his hesitation was, and mostly failing, the longer Tony looked at him like that: like he’d guessed something correctly and wanted to collect his prize accordingly.

“Why did you stop?” Pepper asked, sounding almost offended, and more than a little breathless, herself.

The inventor raised his eyebrows slowly, like he was curious to know too, in a smug sort of way. His hands still up Loki’s shirt, now stroking their thumbs lighting back and forth across the god’s flat nipples as he stared questioningly, was just to add insult to injury, and he enjoyed the little hitch in Loki’s breath as the trickster glared at him a little, struggling to find an answer.

Then, as though a switch had just been flicked, Loki’s expression smoothed into control and he grinned vicious and interested, rolling his hips up hard enough to make the inventor hiss sharply. “Because you, Tony, are being very _impatient_.” His voice was embers landing on dry black velvet, as he slid one hand up from the inventor’s knee, along inner thigh to lightly grasp Tony’s cock through his boxers, tightening his grip a bit too sharply when the inventor tried to roll his hips into the contact and get more friction.

“Fuck,” the engineer gasped, eyes opening a bit wide in surprise, though his hips stilled and he leaned back when the god pushed against one of his shoulders with his free hand, while the other lightly, far too lightly, stroked his erection through the cloth. “Knew you’d be good, but just–– _fffuck_.” He struggled to keep still at the feel of long, slightly cool fingers slipping down the back of his boxers to stroke between his cheeks and across more sensitive flesh, not pressing in, but just teasingly exploring. Tony glanced Pepper’s way and his hips bucked a little again beyond his control, earning him another too-sharp squeeze that dragged a low whine from his throat.

Pepper had tucked her knees under her and slid one hand between her thighs, where she faced them on the couch, staring. Almost every visible inch of her freckled skin was flushed red as she panted quietly behind her other hand, almost biting her palm with the effort not to reach out, because she hadn’t thought this would be so good just to _watch_ , but she didn’t have the anger of her own to match the charge that still lingered in the air between the two men, hero and villain, and didn’t want to interrupt yet. They needed to clear the air, and she... really wanted to watch that process.

Loki turned his stare her way too, lingering thoughtful and predatory.

She lowered her hand from her mouth and held his stare, arching an eyebrow and waving her fingers almost lazily in a gesture urging him to continue. “Do go on, Mr. Lie-smith. Clearly, he needs it, wouldn’t you agree?”

The sound that escaped Tony’s throat at that almost didn’t sound human, and the trickster’s pupils visibly dilated a bit wider in response to both her words, and that reaction to them. “Oh, you _are_ good,” he purred, all lascivious approval.

“I said _go on_ ,” she warned. “We’ve been enjoying his now nearly-nonexistent refractory period ever since the apples, and I’d like you to wreck him at least once before we see about pushing his limits, but if you don’t get on with it, I may play with him myself, instead.”

Loki’s tongue darted across his lower lip, his breathing visibly a bit faster, and responded softly, almost apologetically, though his eyes glittered with mischief, “Yes, Miss Potts. Of course.” He then ripped away the side-seams of Tony’s boxers with both forefingers, hard and sudden enough to make the inventor flinch, then grabbed the front of the destroyed garment and pulled it slowly up, along the inventor’s stomach, so that every inch of shredded silk brought Tony friction and pressure along his cock. Loki allowed the engineer free reign to writhe, at that, without reprisal, until he had lifted all of the cloth away, and tossed it aside.

Tony stared at him, shivering a little, panting and wary, but still uncowed. “That all you got?” he challenged breathlessly.

“On your knees, Tony,” Pepper said, soft but firm.

Both men looked at her, questioning.

She raised her eyebrows at them expectantly in response, daring them not to go along with it. “Between his knees. Get those pants off of him, slowly, and use your teeth wherever possible. Loki... keep still. Arms at your sides.”

“I love you so much, Pepper,” Tony hissed under his breath as Loki tugged him a bit more upright and then let go. It was an effort not to fall, but the inventor caught himself, gripping the god’s thighs hard as he got his feet back under himself just briefly, before sliding his body down Loki’s leather-clad legs until his bare knees rested on the floor, hearing the trickster’s shuddering gasp and grinning up at him, just before he bit at the exposed skin just above the waist of Loki’s pants, where the god’s shirt was still rucked up high about his waist. The way the god’s lean abdominal muscles tightened under his lips in response was a beautiful, beautiful thing.

“Focus, Tony,” his CEO reminded him lightly.

“Right.” Tony closed his eyes and nuzzled at the left side of the ‘v’ where Loki’s abdomen and hips met, while his fingers trailed across leather, finding every clasp, a few laces, and several overly complicated buckles, each and every one coming undone within a few seconds as he worked out the unfamiliar mechanisms, and then began pulling the thick fabric down. He lifted his head as he exposed those pale snake-hips, and glanced up only to pause for a moment and swear reverently.

Pepper had sat up on her knees and leaned across Loki slightly, one hand braced on the back of the couch on his farther side, the other hand tangled in his hair and gripping firmly, holding him in place as she sampled his mouth with her own and made soft noises of heated approval, while the trickster’s fingers gripped the couch-cushions tight enough Tony could almost hear upholstery starting to tear.

Then the god shifted his hips, just a little, and Tony refocused on clothing removal again; although he was more than a little distracted by his girlfriend’s hand trailing up Loki’s chest slowly, taking in the feel of lean muscle and cool skin, until Loki hissed sharply at being suddenly freed from leather confines and Tony was distracted in a whole new direction.

 _Okay, so maybe he is indeed hung as befits a god_ , he thought vaguely, just before he gave in to the urge to lick.

Caught off-guard, Loki gave a keen that sounded almost wounded, which almost covered up the sound of small tears in the upholstery under his hands, his hips arching up helplessly as the inventor’s mouth wrapped around the head of his cock and Pepper swallowed every noise he made with an approving hum of her own; although she pulled back slightly then, to warn Tony, “Finish stripping him or I’ll ask him to come in your mouth and leave you wanting while I have him awhile.”

A soft, wet pop followed. “Fuck, Pep, is that a threat or a promise?”

Loki managed a breathless laugh, “Would you be good while you watched, and waited your turn?”

“Don’t encourage him.”

“Then offer me something more enticing than his mouth on my dick and his punishment, darling,” the trickster countered.

Pepper considered. “Put one of your hands to use, for a start. Tony, he’s still wearing far too much leather.”

“As he is wont to do,” the inventor muttered, his breath warm and very close to where a certain god of lies wanted it, but he only pulled Loki’s pants down further, deliberately teasing this time, slow as he could over every inch, teeth nipping at places the leather clung particularly tight along the way to make the god twitch a little at the sting. All the while, he watched one of the trickster’s pale hands caress its way up Pepper’s thigh to her hip, under her sleep-shirt, and then back down, tugging the hem of her panties.

“Leave them on, for now. You’ve shredded enough underwear; we get it.”

“You want me to tease, then.” He slid his fingertips along the crease of her, deliberately light along her labia and clit through the fabric, making her mouth fall open just a little, her warm puff of breath stirring the air between them where her lips nearly touched his.

“You look like you’re capable of great delicacy of touch, and impressive dexterity,” Pepper complemented, her tone cool and professional again, as though listing the items on someone’s résumé. “Show me how good you really are.”

Sliding his fingers under the delicate waistband, Loki smiled wide and brilliant, not saying another word as she held his gaze, even as he stroked her all the more intimately, pressing between the outer lips of her sex and letting his teeth visibly drag across his lower lip at the feel of smooth, wet skin, slick and hot around his fingers. She gasped a little as he pressed deeper, the movement forcing fabric down off of her hips, but not removing it: just giving him a bit more room to maneuver while not quite disobeying her request to leave them on and intact. His two fingers inside her curled delicately, as his thumb began to rub immaculately-placed little circles right over her clit in flicking motions that pushed back the hood with each upward stroke.

Pepper began to pant more heavily, gripping the back of the couch harder. “Oh fuck,” she gasped, when he began to alternate those rhythmic smaller motions over her clit with quick, shallow thrusts of his long fore- and middle-fingers within her: each stroke inward increasing the pleasure over the external bundle of nerves as his thumb pushed up over it, and each sharp drag out applying friction to sweet spots within that had her shifting her hips almost involuntarily, seeking more as his thumb almost moved away. Her own movements only made him slow or even stop until she stilled again.

“Now just imagine what I might do with more than one hand,” he teased, and nipped at her lower lip. “You feel so exquisite, darling. I can’t wait to taste you.”

“Shut up and don’t stop,” she all but whimpered, and kissed him again even as he chuckled, the vibration of it sending a shiver up through her where it reverberated through their bodies. She heard him inhale sharply as, presumably, Tony finished with his pants and went right back to applying his mouth to the god’s cock. The thought, and the feel of how Loki’s muscles twitched and shivered under her touch at his waist and down to his hip, and the slightly faster tempo of the god’s fingers playing with her sex, sent Pepper over the edge with a tremulous moan, her whole body swaying into Loki’s as he didn’t stop, carrying her through it until her legs began to tremble and she emitted a noise more like pain, gripping his wrist hard. He stilled, and let her pull back from the kiss, after which he held her gaze with some satisfaction as she tried to recover her wits, until something Tony did caused his eyes to snap shut and a surprised moan to rise from his throat despite his clear efforts to stop it.

Pepper glanced down and raised both eyebrows. “Damn. I didn’t know your jaw could handle that,” she mused.

“Well, he does have a large mouth,” Loki grit out, then made a noise at slightly higher pitch, fingers tangling in the inventor’s hair as Tony swallowed around him––all of him. It had actually been some time since the trickster had a partner willing, capable of, and enthusiastic about, taking him to the hilt with mouth alone. “Which I _deeply appreciate_ , Tony. Especially like that, damn, you’re _brilliant_ at that,” he praised sincerely, trying not to buck his hips hard and just _take_.

“That’s enough, Tony,” Pepper said softly.

“No it isn’t,” the trickster said, very quickly.

“It is,” she insisted, in a warning tone, “because I’d like to watch you fuck him like he’s still a hero, and you’re still a villain, because you know how much you _need it_ , and I want to see what you bring out in each other that I don’t, because it’s _gorgeous_.”

Loki stared at her, open-mouthed and struggling not to make a sound as the mad inventor pulled slowly off of him, sucking his cheeks hollow the whole way. When the god’s cock at last slipped free, Loki emitted a sound that seemed to contain equal elements of a growl and a whine, sounding not quite like either. “You are perfection,” he said, a little hoarsely, almost whimpering as she pushed his wrist away slowly, drawing his hand from her sex. Then a ragged sound escaped him as the mad inventor’s mouth wrapped around his fingers instead. “F- _fuck_.”

“Good work, Mr. Stark, you even got him to properly swear,” Pepper mused.

Loki glared down at the inventor then, who pulled back slowly and grinned at him, before very deliberately licking his lips.

Not long after, the god pounced and sent them both to the floor hard enough to shake nearby furniture. Pepper stood quickly, and stepped around to drag the coffee table a few feet further away, hopefully out of range, never taking her eyes off the pair of them. She was fascinated, but also a little wary, her pulse fluttering with the same nervous excitement that it did when Tony risked his life, but with the addition of arousal and desire and a bit less potential lethality than usual.

In theory.

The coffee table had a storage drawer. Pepper knew its contents well, and opened it to seek them out.

In the end, Loki had the mad inventor pinned hard to the floor, face-down, long fingers tight around Tony’s throat, but his expression, while intense, was also keenly scrutinizing. When he could see more pain in the other man’s face than he liked, he eased up the pressure and let Tony breathe.

“Little more oxygen would be nice, yes,” the inventor rasped.

“I don’t know, it brings back memories,” the god purred. “Did you ever imagine that window unshattered, with instead your back against it, bare skin against glass as I fucked you into turning traitor?”

Tony shivered. “If I’d known you wanted me to kneel for the right sort of reasons, I might have actually considered listening, but you were a little over-the-top in your subjugation speeches, frankly.”

“They didn’t really fool you. I could tell, once I could see your face as I spoke.”

“I know bullshit, honey, have you _heard_ me talk?”

“Yes, I have, but I’d prefer to hear you scream, very soon, instead,” Loki mused, trailing a hand down the inventor’s side, fingers tightening a little at Tony’s throat again when he felt the man settle his hands flat against the floor. “Pepper, please hold his wrists for me.”

The inventor stilled, breathing a little more raggedly as Pepper stepped into view. He felt a bit too laid bare suddenly, but she looked down with equal parts appreciation, mild concern, and intrigue, and he relaxed, slowly extending his arms in front of him. He swallowed tightly as she handed Loki a condom and lube, and knelt in front of him, her almost fever-warm hands wrapping around his wrists and holding them down gently, but firmly, her eyes holding his steadily, still curious and careful, but she remained flushed and her breathing wasn’t quite even. She was more distracted when the trickster managed the bottle of lubricant one-handed with messy grace, setting the bottle aside as he slid his fingers against one another to coat them properly.

Then the god hissed in Tony’s ear, “I never craved an enemy as much as I craved you, upon watching you see through my lies with such familiarity and ease despite our having never met, and watching you mock in the face of imminent war and death. I wanted to take you apart to see your inner workings, because had I not been planning to lose already, the appeal of you would have been one of the clearest indications that I was on the wrong side.” Loki glanced up at the redhead, knowing she’d heard and seeing her throat work as she swallowed, but didn’t waver. “And now here you are, Tony, and how eagerly.”

“Fuck you,” the inventor rasped, and stiffened when the god pulled back, and he could hear the faint whisper of discarded foil.

“Another time, perhaps, if you’re very good,” the god purred, and tugged Tony’s hips up and back sharply, until their bodies were again pressed close, and he could easily slide one long finger into the man. “So relaxed for me, I wonder if I’ve lost my touch as a villain.”

“Wanted you to fuck me since you stalked toward me with a play that could’ve won you the whole game, if not for the fucking arc reactor,” Tony gasped, arching his hips back a little further, seeking more.

“Oh, now that would’ve been such a tempting discovery, given a window into your mind just then... and you then so very utterly at my mercy.” He pushed in a second finger, harder.

Tony emitted a low keen at the drag of sharp pressure over his prostate. “What the fuck was your play, anyway? You wanted t-to lose.”

“Your mind, of all available, could have detected my own resistance to the control that scepter also exerted over me, from a much more distant place,” Loki purred. “I would have let you in on my game. You would have chosen well.”

“Fuck, I kind of wish you had.” Then he hissed as those fingers scissored and stretched him, soon joined by a third. He ached with the no-longer-familiar intrusion; it really had been a long damn time since he’d wanted this from anyone, let alone actually gotten it. Slowly relaxing into it by force of will, his head fell forward onto his arms. He felt Pepper’s grip tighten a little when he tried to writhe free subconsciously, and made an incoherent sound in response.

“Goddamn,” Pepper murmured, reverently.

For a moment, glancing up at her face and finding only awestruck heat there, Tony felt something in him shatter into tiny pieces. It might have been his composure, in the face of such open acceptance, from tempting enemy and trusted beloved both: acceptance and desire. It was enough to nearly ruin him, but a ruined Tony Stark could only rise from his own ashes. It was his nature.

When Loki’s fingers retreated, the inventor shifted his hips, getting his knees under himself a little more firmly, bracing his weight for better balance, leaning a bit on his pinned-down forearms for leverage. “Fuck me,” he panted, and then tried not to squirm at the appreciative way Loki stroked his ass, kneading a little at firm muscle and holding him open wide. Then one hand retreated, for use guiding the head of the trickster’s cock into him and Tony pushed back a little with an incoherent moan. The sound trailed off into slight pain as Loki pushed into him, the burn of being further stretched apart making Tony tense.

To his relief, Loki slowed, breathing hard against the back of his neck, and biting, but waiting a few long moments for the inventor to push back against him, seeking more, before he buried himself all the way to the hilt in one hard stroke.

The breath knocked out of him, Tony couldn’t cry out, though he did make a faintly agonized noise when the trickster abruptly pulled out almost fully, but then Loki pushed in hard again, and all at once, and the inventor gave a sound almost like a yowl, his hips shifting just slightly, so the next pull out dragged hard along his prostate and Tony gave a faint cry of mixed want and dismay, quickly smothered and transformed into a moan, then a series of them, as the god began to fuck him in earnest, developing a fast-paced and dominating rhythm that left the inventor wanting to scrabble for grip with his hands, but Pepper still held them hostage. Sans the relief of such anchorage, Tony could do little more than writhe and try not to scream as Loki picked up speed.

The punishing pace that the god set soon had Tony losing track of the minutes, struggling just to remember that breathing was important, and so he wasn’t sure how long Pepper held out before moving her own hips forward and tugging his arms apart, throwing off the trickster’s rhythm only briefly as she pulled Tony’s head down between her legs, with both of her hands tangled near-painfully in his hair, and rasped, “Lick me,” in such urgent tones that the inventor obeyed instantly, his forearms gripping the outside of her thighs and hips as his mouth descended upon her with fervor.

Pepper emitted a high, strangled cry at his messy enthusiasm, beginning to slowly rock her hips against his gratifying mouth as Loki slightly adjusted his own stance, despite being deeply distracted by the sight of them both, and grabbed Tony’s hips still harder, to better pound into him with more force.

Tony tried to focus on Pepper, on the taste of her and the feel of her shudders and the sounds of her breathlessness as he licked and sucked at all of her favorite places, tongue swirling and skillful with long practice; and yet, his performance remained erratic, interrupted by huffing and breathless sounds against her clit and humming moans deep in his throat as Loki kept fucking him hard and deep and so fast Tony couldn’t help but imagine sweat breaking out on pale skin and what expression the trickster must be wearing, if his voice sounded so hungry and felt so tremulous against the skin at the nape of the inventor’s own neck as it did.

“Make her fall apart for us,” Loki moaned in his ear. “Make her come at the sight of you like this, as I fuck you. Hurry, Tony dear, before I make certain that your tongue is useless to you,” he promised, as one long-fingered hand left the mad engineer’s hip in favor or wrapping all-too-gently around Tony’s cock.

Tony’s mouth left its occupation with Pepper’s sex only long enough for him to emit a broken and desperate cry, before he dove back in, sucking all the more frantically, pulling her in closer and swirling his tongue in maddening whorls as he sucked for all he was worth, and Pepper’s hips jerked into the contact for a few long seconds, until her whole body began to tremble, her breaths coming quick and shallow as she made soft, needy noises and let her head fall back, her fingers gripping harder where they were still in Tony’s hair as he kept suckling, tongue still swirling. She gasped and almost screamed when orgasm finally took her, leaving her shuddering as Tony’s mouth carried her through it, and then higher still, before becoming almost painful, from her clit inward and flaring up from the base of her spine, but it was still so good, too good to let him stop.

Then the inventor began to tremble, his grip on her tightening as his own climax approached and his mouth turned gentler, more haphazard, as he struggled to maintain enough brain-power to keep Pepper shuddering while also keeping his mouth occupied. He was whimpering softly, through his nose, the noises shivering up through Pepper’s nerves until she almost wept, rocking her hips slowly again, wanting again.

“Once more, Tony,” Loki rasped, one hand slipping between Tony and the redhead, sliding down low before pushing two fingers upward and into Pepper’s entrance sharply, his wrist putting pressure on the inventor’s throat a little, and adding challenge to Tony’s ability to keep breathing while he licked and sucked at Pepper with all that he was worth. The momentary oxygen deprivation sent a sharp _not good_ tremor through his mind, but it evaporated fast, because Loki kept fucking into him and Pepper tasted perfect against his tongue and he had never felt further from broken, here, wanted by these two people and used by them.

Pepper was shivering again, approaching another peak when she felt Loki's hand move from between her legs to instead grip one of her thighs.

“So close, aren’t you,” the god observed. “Look at him, Pepper dear. Open your eyes and look.”

Helplessly, Pepper obeyed, and looked from Tony’s mouth on herself, down her beloved inventor’s body and up to where the god of lies was taking him, increasingly fast and desperate. “Come, Tony,” she commanded, low and harsh.

Tony’s scant remaining resistance fled him, and he barely managed to suck in a half-gasp before a ragged cry escaped him, loud and jaggedly almost-shrill, and it was enough, along with Loki’s clever fingers, to make Pepper come hard too, soon after him.

Loki followed them just under a minute later, drinking in the sights of them both and the feel of Tony tightened around him at first, then bonelessly pliant, and the intoxicating idea that he had brought them both pleasure first, and been pleasured in his turn by his ability to bring them both bliss. The thought carried him through his own orgasm as he murmured a reverent obscenity against the skin between Tony’s shoulder blades, and barely held himself upright with both of his hands on the floor and his arms braced. Slowly, he lowered his head until his brow rested against the inventor’s spine and something in him unwound like a too-tight spring being snapped, and he almost sobbed with it, before relaxing bonelessly against his lovers, letting them both support him as they all caught their breaths.

Pepper recovered first, observing the two men before her from under a mild haze of sex-heated approval. Then she smirked a little, pulling another condom from the front breast pocket of her now-all-unbuttoned shirt, pushing both men up with little effort in a careless show of her own strength, and sliding under Tony’s body while pulling them both forward. Settled on her back, she reached down to stroke the mad engineer’s still-hypersensitive cock, making him whine and shudder, then begin to gasp softly as discomfort gave way to rapid recovery.

There were such lovely perks to the recuperative abilities given them by golden apples, and Pepper had not actually expected this one, but had grown to enjoy it deeply, just within the past couple of days, and now even more so. Unwrapping a condom and rolling it onto Tony, she curled an arm around both men, stroking up Loki’s back, feeling how his breathing had quickened again and he strained a little, pushing deeper into Tony’s body with renewed arousal and making the inventor moan helplessly. She kissed Tony, slow and heated, for a few moments, then broke away to meet Loki’s stare over his shoulder and demanded, “I want to feel how well you fuck him,” as she arched her hips up, guiding Tony’s length into her and pulling his hips down so he filled her to the hilt, taking both their breaths away.

“As you wish, Miss Potts,” the god purred, and pushed Tony’s legs a bit further apart before beginning to fuck him again, slow at first, but hard, each thrust drawing moans from both of his lovers. “So beautiful, like this, the both of you,” he murmured, close to the engineer’s ear, as he sped up his pace.

The second round was more drawn out, each one of them writhing and taking what they needed from the closeness and friction and bone-melting heat. Pepper kissed both of them, slow and deep, with just a hint of teeth and fire to make them gasp for her,  until she crested again with a mellifluous cry, her head thrown back. Tony followed, taking Loki with him as he deliberately tightened around him. The god moaned low and broken in his ear, that little extra pressure and the faint breathless sounds of both of his lovers at his last few less-coordinated thrusts carrying him through his orgasm and back into heavy exhaustion as his entire body abruptly recalled how little sleep, magic, and other energy reserves he truly had left.

Once pulled out of Tony’s body, he rolled to one side. The inventor rolled the other way, leaving them both close to Pepper’s sides, all three of them breathing hard and feeling boneless. The god had the vague thought that he never wanted to move, but a few minutes later it did become less comfortable, and a bit sticky. Though it ached a little and he shouldn’t have so soon taxed his still-drained reserves, he cast a brief cleaning spell with a murmur and a flick of his wrist.

“Did you just...” Pepper started, turning her head to stare at him.

“Well that’s convenient,” Tony muttered.

“I thought you were all out of magic?” the redhead said lightly.

Loki raised a hand, pinching a sliver of air between his thumb and forefinger. “I have very, very little.”

Tony sat up, rolling Pepper’s way so that she was pressed a little more against the trickster’s side, and he against hers. “You’re outta mojo?”

“What little I have is fueled by a mere hour or two of sleep and a cup of coffee. I think I require more of one, or the other, very soon.”

“Also, why do you smell like smoke?”

“He annoyed fire-giants until the loaned him enough magic to get home,” Pepper answered for him. “Tony, bring coffee.” She patted his head lightly.

The inventor groaned, resting his face between her breasts. “Don’t make me walk quite yet.”

She giggled at him.

“You take that in your ass and see if you still find that so funny,” he muttered.

“If you’re both very good, then maybe next time I’ll be in the middle.”

Both men were very still for a moment.

“I fucking love you,” Tony said, with feeling, still slightly muffled against her skin.

Loki kissed the top of her shoulder reverently, lacking words.

Pepper hummed, low and satisfied, folding her arms behind her head. “We’re not napping on the floor.”

“Should I carry you, Tony?” the trickster teased lightly.

The inventor gave it serious consideration. “Maybe.”

 

~~

 

In the end, Tony made it back into to the bedroom primarily on his own, and emerged in a pair jeans and t-shirt, tossing Loki a pair of jeans suspiciously the perfect size and cut, as well as a black T-shirt.

“Your nudity is very distracting,” he said, at the god’s amused and inquiring glance. He still ogled openly as the trickster dressed.

Pepper left the bedroom next, in denim shorts and Tony’s Black Sabbath shirt, returning to her place on the couch to find that Loki had figured out the coffee maker remarkably fast, including finding her usual flavor presets. “Thank you,” she said into the fresh cup, smiling at him a little.

Tony sat beside her where Loki had earlier, tugging the god to sit down next to him as soon as he was dressed. “So. We’re keeping you awhile.”

“Yes. I’m not able to travel or defend myself as I am usually capable, and will need a full week before even small, simple spells cease to pain me a bit to use.”

“Yeah...” The inventor shot him a slightly odd look, at that admission. “You’re seriously grounded and nowhere near your usual resources, then.”

“Do I need to admit outright that this is an experimental show of trust on my part, or have you caught that already?” Loki inquired lightly.

“It’s pretty obvious,” Tony assured. “Doesn’t mean I’m not surprised.”

The god half-smiled. “I like surprising you.”

“What exactly happened with the whole... soul and corpse thing?” the engineer asked, with a vague hand-waving gesture to indicate magical what-the-fuckery.

“My other self apparently had quite a reputation, with people capable of intercepting even mine and my daughter’s travel-spells. We are... difficult to detect and track, let alone capture. They diverted us multiple times, until we were forced to use more and more obscure paths between the realms without teleportation of any kind. We slipped out of reality, instead.” He waved off Tony’s inquiring look in a manner that suggested he would explain the mechanics of that another time. “In the end, I led them on a chase through half the realms, carrying that device formerly embedded in his chest, which seemed to be how they tracked him, while Hel slowly made her way as subtly as possible the long way back to Asgard. She wove a spell into the device I took with me, so that when his body burned, so did it. By then, I was in Muspellheim and had provoked a city full of powerful fire-giants. I had intended to let them roll over the others chasing me, when they arrived, while I made my escape, but the ‘escape’ didn’t work as planned, quite infuriatingly. A lot of violent deaths followed, but at the cost of almost everything I had left of my magic reserves.”

Pepper added, “And then you found some mages among the natives and made them want to get rid of you, but they couldn’t kill you, so they finally loaned you enough power to jump back to earth?”

Loki nodded. “Quite.”

“Wait, seriously?” Tony sounded deeply amused.

“Yes. I have such a way with people, after all,” the god deadpanned.

The inventor sniggered. “You certainly do.”

“We should probably explain things to Thor a bit,” Pepper reminded them lightly, “before Steve or Clint have one of their perpetually inconveniently-timed urges to talk to us out of the blue.”

Tony grimaced. “I swear, they sense when they are not wanted.”

Loki snorted, amused. “You can’t be serious.”

JARVIS spoke, then: “Sir, Miss Potts: Steve Rogers is inquiring if you are both conscious and decent. He has made breakfast and seems to think both of you need it. I suspect he is using the lure of food as a means to corner you into conversation about your behavior of recent.”

The trickster’s eyebrows raised. “Your behavior?”

“Also, Mr. Barton has a few schematics for those new arrow concepts you’ve been avoiding his efforts to bring to your attention for the past week.”

“We’ve been around the tower more,” Pepper admitted, “conspicuously lingering in the common rooms. We do that when something is bothering us, because being around the rest of the Avengers as they go about their usual routines is oddly comforting.” She cleared her throat.

“Also maybe having quiet but obvious serious talks more, while at it,” Tony said. “I never said we didn’t _partially_ inflict this on ourselves.”

“Tell Steve we’ll be down in about thirty or forty minutes, with a guest, and ask Thor to come to the penthouse, please, JARVIS,” Pepper said, and looked at Loki a bit questioningly, after seeing his slight grimace out of the corner of her eye. “You know we have to.”

“I do,” he agreed, with reluctance.

“He has inquired who your guest is,” said the AI, a few moments later.

A pause followed.

“Someone he won’t like, but we promise to explain,” Pepper said. “Also assure him that the guest in question isn’t picky about food?” She looked at him to be sure, since she hadn’t actually asked.

The trickster nodded. He really wasn’t.

“Add in that he does have an appetite like Thor’s,” Tony suggested.

Loki inclined his head in silent thanks.

“I will do so, Miss Potts,” JARVIS assured.

Tony could feel the god beginning to radiate tension and watched Loki’s expression grow more closed off by the second. He then leaned a little closer and bit the trickster’s shoulder sharply.

Loki stared at him, bemused. “What are you doing?”

“Now you’re less tense.”

“What...” He narrowed his eyes a little at the inventor.

“Don’t over-think it. You’re not on your own for this one.”

The god blinked at that, his shoulders relaxing just a little, more out of confusion than any actual release of the annoyance and nervousness that had caused them to tense up in the first place. “I do not-”

“I’m not saying you need us here, but I’m telling you it doesn’t have to be as hard as it usually is if you let us help a bit. It’s not like this isn’t kind of our business too, and you kind of are too, just in general, now.” He cleared his throat. “By the way, we’re dating you.”

Loki let out soft laugh, heavy with incredulity, but the smile lit up his eyes brightly. “Very well, then,” he said, intrigued and thoughtful. He still scowled and glared a bit at the elevator when it dinged, and the doors opened, letting Thor in.

The thunderer entered cautiously, raising his eyebrow a bit at how close the three sat on the very large couch which could have very easily accommodated more distance between them. Instead they were, while not actually cuddling, still cuddly-looking. Thor was used to seeing the inventor and Pepper so, but the addition of his brother to the casual intimacy explained a lot, while also raising far more questions, of a sort that the blond god almost wasn’t sure he wanted answers to––particularly not detailed ones.

“You appear drained, but otherwise good health, Loki,” Thor greeted.

“Im entirely drained of my magic, yes. It will take time for me to recuperate,” the trickster responded. He gestured at a spot further down the couch. “Sit, please. I have much to explain. We all do.”

“Yes... and that puzzles me deeply,” his brother responded, but he did step around the still-displaced coffee table and take a seat a couple of feet from Loki’s side, facing the three of them, aided by the curved shape of the couch itself.

“My other self, the Traveler, had a particular pattern he ascribed to his jumps, making them very selective,” Loki began. “He landed in universes which were at risk of being destroyed like his own, with intent to save those he valued most in his life: his loves, and their family.” He cleared his throat. “Identifying the right universe, he had perfected, somehow. Even now, having studied a little closer that device he wore across his chest, I still do not quite understand the way he had interwoven Midgardian technology, powerful magics, and his own body and blood, to achieve his jumps, but it seemed that his... ‘landing gear’ as it were, required constant maintenance and upkeep. Some of his jumps, he arrived... too early. His family, and the loves of his life, were not yet known to the version of himself in some universes. That was, apparently, the case with this jump, which was his last.”

“So the universe is under threat... and you...” Thor glanced at Tony and Pepper both, looking concerned and uncertain. “You both are well?”

“Fantastic, actually. It doesn’t even hurt much to sit,” Tony responded blithely, making his girlfriend almost choke on a sip of coffee.

With a slight cough, she elbowed Tony and assured the thunderer, “We’ve had time to consider the idea, and the Traveler left us with a lot of data, including... well, memories and recordings of ourselves from other universes. We were scared, initially, but we’re too curious and interested to _not_ pursue something.” She raised her eyebrows at him. “Wouldn’t you be, if somehow a version of you from somewhere else met you before your banishment, and told you about a brilliant mortal woman you’d one day be head over heels in love with? Wouldn’t you have want to know?”

Thor considered for a long moment, then nodded, smiling softly. “Yes, I suppose I would have,” he conceded. “As long as you are all well, however strangely.” He raised an eyebrow at his brother.

Loki raised one back coolly, finishing his own coffee and setting the empty mug down beside him. His fingers lingered on it, tapping silently. “For the... sake of our shared privacy and keeping peace under this roof, I believe cooler heads among the Avengers suggested we not mention... this part of the matter to either Captain Rogers or Mr. Barton,” he said.

“Why, then, would your other self have come here?” his brother asked.

“We were thinking ‘because you happened to be in our penthouse at the time’ would do,” Pepper said. “Natasha’s idea. She and Bruce are aware of this, and the Cancer-verse matter. We’ll explain that, and the rest, to the others and you when we head downstairs.”

“I presume that is the threat to our own universe?” Thor inquired.

All three of them nodded.

“I see... how...” He hesitated. “Brother, your rule as Odin was... I had regained such confidence in our father, I thought. He seemed a better man than before, and I know now that was you being him as you thought he should have been.” He swallowed tightly. “You were a better king than I would be, as I am now.”

The trickster, whose fingers had been idly tracing meaningless shapes on his empty coffee mug, froze at that. “I... know not what to say to that.”

“Pepper said, back in Asgard, that the Three consider you more like them, than like a king,” Thor said slowly. “Should I ever take the throne, Loki, I would wish you to be to me what they are to their kingdoms.”

Loki leaned back from his brother slightly, his mind reeling. “ _What?_ ”

“You heard me,” the thunderer said. “Odin will never have the wisdom to make such a request, but seeing how well you feigned kingship, even if only to put a permanent wound in his pride with your name branded along its edges, I know you to be far wiser than I.” Seeing his brother’s eyes snap shut in pained disbelief at that admission, Thor continued with just a little more urgency, “You were always my advisor, when we were young, but I never would admit that I resented your cleverness, for making me feel inferior to you, despite how others saw only reasons for the jealousy to be reversed, looking upon us from the outside. They should not have. I should have overcome my pride sooner and appreciated you the more.”

“Stop, please,” the trickster asked, very quietly, his voice wavering. He was shaking, and leaning heavily on the inventor next to him, for lack of anywhere else to escape. He flinched at first, at a soft touch on his hand from Pepper’s fingers, but rather than let her pull back, Tony took her wrist gently, and held her there. Loki didn’t move his hand away from them, and soon Pepper tried again, this time letting her hand clasp his own firmly. He returned the grasp, squeezing slightly in silent thanks. Loki took a deep breath, and opened his eyes, aware they were leaking slightly, but determined to ignore it. “You are not yet forgiven,” he said, his voice a bit rough, but his anger sounded tired, like it wasn’t nearly so powerful as before––like, just perhaps, it was wearing out.

“I have much left to learn, I know,” Thor responded, looking pained to see the hurt and anger and lingering incredulity in his brother’s expression.

“You do,” the trickster agreed, flat and a little disapproving, but he then grudgingly added, “and my life would be so much easier if I could ever bring myself to give up trying to teach you. You are lucky that I cannot.”

Hope broke out, golden and heartbreaking, on Thor’s face. “You...”

“When you are king, I will be what you and your kingdom will both need,” Loki said, “but your subjects will resent me for it.”

“I have already begin to tell them the truth,” Thor said. “They do love to overhear stories amongst myself and the Warrior’s Three in taverns throughout the realm, and spread them like wildfire.”

“You’re _kidding_ me,” Loki almost squawked.

“I am not,” the thunderer said quietly. “People have been very proud of all of the changes you had made, as Odin, of the new ease with which the people of other realms can reach us. They are awed that you have visited Nifelheim and been welcomed, and keep asking me if you’ve made any mention of what the Nameless City is really like. They speak of the thaw of Jotunnheim as though it were the return of some long-lost treasure to all the realms, Loki. Our mages have gone to Odin, asking permission to travel there, to aid and to learn from what lies beneath the ice.” He smiled, proud and a little smug, at his brother’s utterly pole-axed expression. “You were right, that they would only believe it from me, as I am. So I gave them the truth.”

“You actually listened to me and came up with a brilliant plan to spread dissent against Odin throughout the realms of your own accord,” the younger god said faintly. “Who are you and what have you done with my brother?”

Tossing his head back, Thor laughed loud and long, at that.

Pepper covered her mouth with her free hand, squeezing Loki’s hand a little tighter with the other, anchoring him.

Tony elbowed him lightly, and said, “You know, I think he’s growing up.”

“Apparently,” Loki replied, still a bit dazed, wiping his face dry with the edges of his palm. “I cannot believe... You can’t be serious, but you...”

“I do not know if I have ever rendered you speechless so successfully before,” Thor mused, quite pleased with himself.

His brother could only stare for a long moment. Then he picked up his coffee cup and touched Pepper’s hand with it, causing her to release him and take hold of it. The trickster then very calmly moved closer to his brother along the couch and embraced him, somehow making it seem aloof and not at all undignified, with the ease of a cat.

Thor was still stunned by it, remaining very still, at first, before his arms engaged and he drew his brother closer, shutting his eyes as he rested his brow on Loki’s shoulder with an unsteady huff.

“You do not know why I find what you have done so impossible to believe,” the younger god said quietly, his own voice wavering. “I have never been welcomed as your equal by Asgard. I have to believe that you’ve misunderstood, that you’re somehow wrong, because I _don’t want_ to forgive those people after all this time.”

“I’m sorry. They don’t deserve you any more than I do,” Thor rasped.

Loki pulled back, then, leaving one hand gripping his brother’s shoulder. “You, I can forgive, in time. Your people, in their turn, will see the errors of their ways now that they know me, and I know they want my approval even more than I ever wanted theirs.” He grinned, fierce and unkind.

The thunderer appeared hesitant. “You will make nothing easy for any king of Asgard, I think.”

“You all had it ‘easy’ for far too long,” Loki responded. “And some things are the better, for having nothing easily.”

“Easy for you to say, perhaps.” Thor glanced over his shoulder at the two mortals, who looked away quickly, as though giving them some semblance of privacy, and the pretense made the blond god chuckle. “You had _hints_.”

The trickster chuckled, low at first, but it proved difficult to stop and became a genuine burst of laughter. “Ha! Hah, yes, and all I had to do was have my plans for Odin prematurely foiled, suffer abrupt emotional turmoil by being subjected to a memory-dose from my alternate self laced with all of his regrets, watch myself die horribly, and spend two days being chased around the nine realms carrying a mechanical apparatus formerly embedded in his flesh and bone while creatures from beyond our own universe sought to steal his soul before it could be collected by Mistress Death in a fall of fire-” He raised a finger, to bring attention to this last point. “-which was necessary because his soul was bound to his body to prevent outbreak of the _magic-devouring plague in his blood_ that could have rotted all of Yggdrasil within weeks, requiring that his body and soul both be purged by fire while he was respectfully sent to his rest because Mistress Death will only appear when actually called for an needed if ceremony is heaped high in show of respect for her!” he concluded, with bitter but still genuine amusement. “Yes, yes, I’ve clearly had it _easy_.” He chuckled again, wiping a tear of amusement from the corner of one eye.

Thor frowned in concern. “Well, when you put it in quite those terms...”

“Still, less of a long-term investment than the personal assistant tactic, with magic-and-technology trading on the side,” Pepper pointed out. “Saves so much time on angst, after all.”

“Does it?” Loki inquired.

“Have you met us?” Tony asked Pepper. “We’ll angst regardless because we still all not-so-secretly suspect this will be a train-wreck.”

“I don’t,” she said flatly.

Loki and Tony both turned to stare at her in shock.

“That’s right, boys. I have faith in you, and you’re helpless to resist stepping up to be as good as I believe you are, because you want to be, for me,” she teased.

“I think I love you,” the trickster said softly.

Tony frowned at him.

“You, I almost expected to fall for as soon as the Traveler’s implications about us became clear,” Loki said flatly to the inventor, his hand dropping from Thor’s shoulder to gesture toward Pepper. “ _Her_ , I could never have expected. She had the element of surprise on her side, but if it makes you feel better, Tony: I am enamored with your intellect, your wit, and your mouth, and even when your arrogance frustrates me, at this point, I find imagining you on your knees making it up to me causes that irritation to evaporate entirely and I just sort of feel affection and arousal, such as right now.”

Thor surreptitiously moved himself a little further from his brother, making the younger god’s grin widen further, because his elder brother’s discomfiture and embarrassment were always to be savored.

The inventor mulled that over for a moment, smirking as he did so. “Turnabout is fair play, you know.”

“I’m looking forward to that too,” Loki assured.

“We should join the others downstairs, I believe,” Thor said quickly. “Steven will be nearly finished preparing breakfast.” He then paused. “Perhaps one of us should warn him, and Clint, of your joining us?”

“JARVIS, tell Natasha that we’re having a team meeting over breakfast with our guest,” Tony said. “She’ll get the picture, and if she doesn’t mention Loki within five minutes, just go ahead and remind her who the guest is. It’ll get the ball rolling.”

“Now I really hope she won’t mention me for the next five minutes,” the trickster sniggered, sidling closer to the inventor again, though he looked at Thor expectantly. “You tell the truth for me, and now plan to lie on behalf of my lovers, Thor. What’s become of you?” he teased.

“Loki!”

“I am grateful,” he added, more gently.

Thor relaxed slightly, at that. “I am more interested in seeing whether the three of you do not reveal yourselves within mere minutes,” he teased in return.

Loki considered that for a moment. “The Traveler’s part in our relationship, I do think should be left unmentioned, but how long exactly would you prefer them to be unaware of our relationship itself?”

Tony opened his mouth, then shut it. “Actually, I’m still feeling sufficiently smug and well-shagged that I kind of want to rub it in their faces, so I’m going to defer to you, here, Pep.”

Taking in the trickster’s wickedly mirthful smile at that, Pepper sensed that the god would have no problem with that plan. “For the sake of not wanting either of you shot with arrows today, showing up with just-had-sex hair and both of us on your arm would be a bit much, but I don’t see why, if they maybe wonder about how at ease we seem to be with you, Loki, that we have to be either 100% open, nor deny much of anything either,” she suggested.

“Tease,” Loki accused, with approval.

“Play along with me.” She winked at him.

Tony bit his lip. “Okay, admittedly, I’d like to see this.”

“I had thought _Angrboða_ had encouraged your mischief to a frightful extent, but I concede this is still more frightening,” Thor intoned dryly, looking at his friends with sudden realization, like he had only just remembered all he knew about them, and about his brother, and was seeing all of that knowledge in a new and daunting light.

Loki grinned fiercely, as did Tony, while Pepper looked mildly questioning like she had no earthly idea what he could possibly mean, which was somehow more frightening than the grins of the other two.

Thor had always considered Pepper to be clever, and stronger than she often believed herself to be, with more than enough brash mettle to act as foil to Tony Stark’s mind and wit, and he was in awe of her polite and crisp control when matters were serious, and the sharp way she could maneuver through and around powerful people on the occasions that she had acted as the Avengers’ PR team, or as a legal buffer between them and S.H.I.E.L.D., but he had foremost seen her as warm-hearted, gentle, and kind. It was only now he seemed to become aware that in truth, she possessed a slyness and cunning underneath, very much of a sort Loki would appreciate, as a master of such arts himself.

Tony Stark, too, was always more than he let on, always ten steps further ahead than anyone would guess just from talking to him, until they had known him long enough to see certain patterns in his behavior and problem-solving. Always planning, always sharper and more self-aware and externally aware both than he really seemed to be...

The thunder god shook his head slowly. He did not say it, but he strongly suspected he was looking at an unstoppable force of nature in the making, and almost wanted to laugh, if he weren’t also deeply disconcerted.

To his relief, JARVIS chose that moment to interrupt them again, “Natasha has informed them of your guest’s identity, and explained his current status as ally to the Avengers with intent to face a greater universe-wide threat. She has asked that you all join them in the dining room, now.”

Loki rose to his feet and offered a hand to each lover, pulling them lightly to their feet. He kissed each of them, brief and appreciative and only a little tease of tongue. “Thank you,” he said softly.

Seeing how they looked at each other, Thor felt a little reassured, that there was genuine warmth between them, even amidst all the sharp teeth and claws. He rose to his feet and followed them into the elevator.

“Brother,” Loki said briefly, tugging him aside for a moment. The humans let them have a moment, Tony holding the doors with one hand on the frame.

“You are happy?” Thor asked softly.

“It is far too early to ask me that, but I want to be,” the trickster said.

“What did your other self show you? You were clearly harrowed by it, by the time I returned to the throne room, and did not answer them, then, not truly.”

“He showed me his children,” Loki said softly. “They were beautiful, Thor. Looking upon them felt like the first time I saw Hel, and I knew immediately that they were why he was doing what he was doing––that only that loss, of his entire family, not only those two but Hel and Fenrir to the Universal Church of Truth, too, in their efforts to destroy Death herself––only that totality of loss drove him to that desperation, and caused him such pain that he could easily endure greater horrors than I now ever could, because compared to the pain in his heart, the rest was nothing. He did not believe his flesh deserved less than pain, any longer, and I knew then that I would not either, in his place.” He swallowed thickly. “You know how much my children mean to me, Thor. You have seen the lengths to which I would go.”

“And have gone, yes,” the thunderer whispered, gripping his brother’s shoulder firmly. “I am so sorry.”

Loki only shook his head. “It was far in his past, and it will now never be my future, thanks to him. That... that I consider more than worth it.” He rested a hand over Thor’s at his shoulder, and squeezed back. His smile, while sly and suggesting there was more he was still keeping secret, was warm and more genuine than any he had offered his brother in a very long time. “Come. Let us save the universe, brother.”

He stepped away then, and with a sad but touched smile of his own, Thor did follow.

 

~~

 

Loki caught the arrow aimed for his eye. “You could have at least waited until I left the elevator.”

“I also would’ve actually used a bow if I really wanted it to work,” Clint shot back. “Or activated it for detonation,” he pointed out.

The trickster recognized the arrowhead, then, as very similar to one which had once exploded very close to him. It had also flown surprisingly fast, for an arrow not launched from a bow. “Point taken.” He tossed it back, lightly, and the archer caught it, putting it back in the quiver hanging off the back of his chair. There were indeed a few blueprint papers rolled up and stored in the quiver, too, the god noticed, as he stepped free of the elevator, closely followed by his brother at his back. Pepper and Tony strode past them to sit at their usual places at the table.

“So... why were you in Tony’s penthouse?” Clint asked.

“They became caught up in matters between myself, and a visiting alternate version of myself from another universe,” Loki explained casually. “He landed in the penthouse because Thor was there, but he was also nearly dead. They joined Thor, in delivering him to Asgard, where I have been ruling the kingdom and impersonating Odin for the past three years or so, by Midgardian measure, ever since faking my own death in Svartalfheim.”

“What did he want?” Steve asked.

“To preserve those most important to him where he had failed in his own universe,” Loki said. “He had jumped to over a hundred before ours, sometimes landing a little too early in the time-stream, though the failsafes to prevent his landing too late did occasionally wear out, to his great dismay.”

“How did he lose them?” inquired the archer.

“They were lost within the madness and warfare which broke out when a neighboring universe began to invade theirs, with intent to kill Death herself, as a force in their universe, which sounds fairly heroic until you realize that if nothing and no one is actually dying, calamitous plagues of disease and mutation ensue. In time, all life in the universe would become twisted by it, like the unchecked growth of cancer-cells,” the god said. “His universe was lost, consumed by the cancer of that other: all of his family, friends, and lovers killed before the end, and thus irretrievably lost, which was still a kinder fate that any of them would have endured if they had been alive when Mistress Death was struck down.”

The trickster shook his head slowly, pushing back flickers of memory not his own, of glimpses of some of the monstrous inhabitants his other-self had seen, near the edge of the breach between universes. “He escaped by creating a device combining some of Stark’s technology with his own magics, but did not manage to leave before being infected by the Universal Church of Truth with a magic-devouring plague which was only temporarily suspended within each of his jumps between universes. The illness was terminal, and without cure; he died of it three days ago, and I spent my time since then trying to keep his soul out of the hands of unspeakably powerful horrors from multiple other universes, whom he had managed to irritate over time.” He held out both hands to either side of himself, palms-forward. “I rather value my own life, and would prefer not to become a twisted cancerous monstrosity unable to die even if I might wish to, and I require the aid of the Avengers to achieve this, I now know.”

“Tony Stark in particular, if your other-self was close enough to him to understand and get his hands on that kind of tech from him,” Clint mused.

Loki inclined his head affirmatively. “I have always respected Tony’s mind, yes.”

Steve and Clint exchanged glances, at that.

“You have?” Steve asked.

“He was the only one of you who realized I deliberately botched the invasion of New York, and that my overall goal was to cause the whole thing to explode in the face of those who wanted the tesseract badly enough to aid me in returning to the nine realms with the promise of conquest to get it,” Loki mused lightly. “So yes, I do appreciate an intellect better able to keep up with my own than either of yours.” He paused for a moment. “Also: good morning, Agent Romanov, and Dr. Banner. I look forward to working with you.”

“Now you’re just being a dick,” Clint said flatly.

“For the record, Mr. Barton, if I did not appreciate your own capabilities, competence, and psychological resilience, I would never have borrowed your mind,” Loki responded. “My apologies, but you really were the best candidate available, at the time. I did try to borrow Tony’s, but the device embedded in his chest presented an unexpected resistance to the scepter’s control.”

“That’s not reassuring,” Steve told him, his tone dry.

“If I tried to reassure you genuinely, you would simply assume me to be lying, would you not, Captain Rogers?” queried the god of mischief.

The soldier considered. “You have a point.”

Loki smiled sweet and poisonous in response.

“Would you give us your solemn word that everything you just said is true?” Steve asked lightly.

“No, actually, but I can assure you that all of what I have told you _about my own intentions_ was true. I cannot be certain that my interpretation of my alternate self’s motives is 100% accurate, and I do try not to risk that sort of thing, knowing myself as I do,” the trickster countered, letting that excuse prevent his blood boiling over the minor lies about the Traveler’s purposes and actions, like his intentions being aimed at Thor instead of the other two people in the penthouse that night. “Will that suffice?”

“I’ll take it,” Natasha said, before either the archer or super-soldier could complain. “And so should you two.” She eyed them both pointedly.

“Fine,” Clint muttered.

Steve only nodded to her, and watched Loki in the same steady, wary manner.

Loki raised a hand pointedly and added, “Did I not mention the part wherein I abdicated the throne in Asgard, giving it back to Odin, only a little earlier than planned, thanks to the interruption of my other self? Honestly, I found kingship rather tedious.”

“Will you... swear to that?” Steve asked, a bit confused.

“I swear on my life,” assured the trickster. “I’m not actually set on conquest, these days, nor need I be. I’m much more suited to diplomacy, by my nature, actually.”

“Are you serious?” the super-soldier asked.

“He is,” Pepper assured. “He’s actually got political clout from Nifelheim and Jotunnheim both, lately.”

“Didn’t you try to destroy one of those?” Clint asked.

“Yes, and my half-brother, who mourned our father, who I murdered, is king of the most powerful kingdom there. I am welcome there, and valued to them, for bringing about permanent peace between them and Asgard, and reconnecting them with their distant kin in Nifelheim, who are helping them rebuild and rehabilitate their war-torn planet,” Loki bragged lightly, smiling.

Steve raised a hand in silent question.

“He’s not lying,” Thor said, before the question became less silent.

The super-soldier nodded. “Thank you.”

Clint was making a face at him. “Who are you, and what did you do with the psychopathic would-be tyrant I know and hate?”

“I put him in a prison for a while, and then the throne of Asgard for three years, and he regained a bit of his sanity, and he turned into me,” said the trickster. “I’m not sorry to disappoint your desire to continue passionately despising me.”

“And you have _decent jokes_ now? Where was this wit when I had to listen to you rant about ruling the world, dude?” the archer demanded.

“I was putting on a show for the leader of the Chitauri watching me via the scepter, to give him no reason to suspect my disloyalty. I rather had to keep in character. I am sorry for that,” the god sighed. “They needed to believe I was a more fragile personality, easily manipulated, and easily usurped and disposed of in the event of my success.”

“That... does make some sense,” Clint admitted. “You owe me, though.”

“Perhaps,” Loki said, waving a hand in a dismissive manner, but he did sense that the air was cleared, somewhat, and approached the table, taking the seat at Tony’s left, where the inventor occupied the end of the table, which had the trickster facing Pepper across the table. He smiled at them both charmingly, and as an afterthought also aimed it at Natasha, who occupied the seat to his left.

“You’re ridiculous,” Pepper reminded him, amused.

The trickster rested a hand over his heart. “You wound me.”

“How much review of the data your other self left you have you gotten through?” the assassin inquired.

“I only just returned from Muspellheim last night, so not much.” He then turned to the inventor. “How have those decryption programs we worked out been going on the data he left us, Tony?”

“Got about half of the first two drives,” the engineer explained, “The data is pretty dense reading, though. It maps out multiple event timelines ranging from more scattered info as far back as Mar-Vell’s birth, and to as far forward as five years from now. Based on the number of events in our universe JARVIS has been able to correlate, we fall between pretty normal ranges, and the Cancer-verse is likely to show up no later than five years from now, and no earlier than three.”

“You’ve been working with him already?” Steve asked.

“His other self appeared in the middle of my penthouse. We got dragged along for the ride,” Tony lied easily; although under the table his leg leaned comfortably along Loki’s on one side, Pepper’s on the other. Being in the middle meant, technically, he was the center of attention, and he was pretty much fine with that being a frequent thing, in casual and intimate situations alike.

“You didn’t feel like mentioning it?” Steve asked lightly.

“We knew how it would look, and sound, without him here to make his case and swear to it. Giving you only some information about what two gods of lies told us, we’re aware, does not a great deal of trust inspire,” Pepper responded. “We didn’t want to shut you out, but we also had enough to worry about, including personal things we now know about how our own futures may turn out, which weighed heavily on our minds and weren’t something we wished to share. It was also technically still unfinished business, given Loki hadn’t returned from disposing of his own body, and I personally felt that we needed him here for this, before bringing everyone else in.”

“When did you get in on this?” Clint asked Natasha lightly.

“Only yesterday, when they asked for my insight in best introducing the matter to you particularly, but also you too Steve,” the assassin admitted. “I advised as I saw fit.”

Reluctantly, Steve nodded, and joined them at the table, next to Bruce and across from Clint, as they all began filling their plates with various breakfast meats, eggs, toast, and biscuits. “I’m glad I don’t have to worry about you as my enemy, if only because you’re not even remotely fun to fight,” he said to Loki directly, after a few long moments.

The god smirked a little, recalling how sort of therapeutic it had felt, thrashing him around in Germany. “Well, I will just have miss it enough for the both of us.”

“So your creepiness, you weren’t faking for the façade,” Clint mused airily. “Good to know; although it’s better than your flirting.”

“You would hardly know, little bird; I’ve _scarcely begun_ to do any of that, this morning,” Loki mocked. “Would you like me to show you, to confirm your hypothesis, however?” He trailed his fingers lightly over the back of Tony’s hand on the table, tracing up from his knuckles along tendons to his wrist.

“Please don’t,” the archer said, with feeling.

“Tony dear, would you like me to stop?” the trickster asked.

The inventor seemed to think it over. “Try my thigh, instead, if he’s so squeamish. I’m willing to compromise.”

“Tony, please, just don’t,” Steve sighed.

“Don’t compromise?” Tony asked mildly.

“Don’t flirt back with the creepy ex-villain while we’re eating,” Clint said flatly.

“But he’s so pretty,” the inventor argued. “Look at him.” He gestured with his fork. “Pep, help me out here.”

“He’s fairly easy on the eyes, yes, but you don’t even flirt with me this shamelessly at the table, Tony. Don’t be rude,” she chided.

“So I should flirt with you more?” he offered.

“Tony,” she warned softly, shooting him a look.

He sighed and looked at Loki wistfully. “Unless you can persuade her, Loki, I think we may have to stop.”

“I will kill both of them,” the archer grumbled.

“No you won’t,” Natasha said, in a light tone that nevertheless indicated she would accept no argument.

Loki held Pepper’s gaze steadily for several moments. Whatever else he might have been doing aside from that was quiet enough, as an activity, that the others didn’t notice much of anything at first, until Pepper’s blush went from her face down to her collar within another few seconds, like a reddish-pink beacon.

“You okay, Pepper?” Steve asked lightly.

She cleared her throat and sat up a little straighter, her voice perfectly calm and level as she responded, “I’m fine, Steve, thank you.” She didn’t look away from the trickster’s eyes in the least; however, after another few seconds, she visibly bit her lip.

Slowly, Clint began to suspect something. “Hand check!”

Tony lifted both of his hands into plain sight. Pepper did too, along with Steve and Thor who were mostly uncertain what was going on and what strange modern earth cultural custom this was; although Bruce and Natasha just shot the archer exasperated looks and continued eating. After a long second, Loki raised both of his too, out from under the table, smiling innocently. Pepper blushed a little brighter for a moment.

“I don’t want to know,” Clint said.

“What is this, exactly?” Thor asked, as all parties lowered their hands.

“Wait, did you think he was––” Steve started, then stared wide-eyed in disbelief at the archer. “I know I’m old-fashioned, but that would just be––Tony is right there!”

“He’s also bisexual and Loki is pretty by villain standards, and complimented his brain earlier,” Clint deadpanned. “That, Steve, is a recipe for shameless bad behavior.”

“Wait, what?” The soldier’s brow furrowed.

“I like some men,” Tony said, with a casual shrug. “Not many, but I’m not exactly going to limit myself to one gender or anything, now. Why would I have denied so many a chance to catch my interest?”

“That part, I understand, though I am slightly surprised. You’re...” Steve gestured vaguely. “Uhm.”

“Do I need to call Monica?” Tony sighed.

“No! I just... you’re in a relationship.” He waved toward Pepper.

“That doesn’t change anything,” the inventor said flatly.

“He’s right, actually. I’m also attracted to women, regardless of the fact we’re exclusive,” Pepper added. She tried not to notice how Loki’s eyebrows raised in open interest at that little revelation. “Sexuality doesn’t change just because both of us are no longer looking for anyone new.”

Steven hesitated. “I... I’ll talk to Monica later,” he muttered. “Still, Clint, that’s a bit rude to suggest.”

“Whatever Loki was doing over there wasn’t exactly kosher for the breakfast table, either,” Clint insisted. “I don’t want to know what it was, so I’m not asking, but it was something.”

“I’m a little curious,” Tony said.

“I am not,” Thor intoned gravely.

“Just... Pepper, can you confirm or deny please?” Steve asked, blushing himself.

“I have no complaints,” she said.

Clint choked.

The super-soldier blushed further still, as he realized that really did not either confirm or deny at all, technically, but Pepper was still a little flushed; and yet, her expression was very calm and  even a little amused, as focused very intently on her own plate of food. He strongly suspected this was a sly way of her admitting that something had happened, and she had been enjoying it, and Steve was not at all sure how to handle that information in any sort of conversational manner, and so didn’t say a word, and quickly looked away.

“Wait, wait,” the archer rasped, after Natasha had slapped his back hard enough his face almost hit the table and he stopped choking. “What?”

“You heard me,” Pepper said, her tone mild, “didn’t you?”

Clint stared at her like he was undergoing a similar set of realizations to those Thor had undergone within the same hour, regarding Pepper Potts and the word “sly” becoming more emphasized in connection with her nature. “Good luck, dude,” he said to Tony. “I don’t want to know.”

“But _how_...” Steve trailed off, a little lost.

“Ask Miss Rambeau about polyamory-related social etiquette,” Tony suggested.

The archer coughed. “Please, guys. You’re making this meal more hazardous than the last battle I was in. Think of my lungs, and try to imagine mercy is a thing to you, maybe a little.”

“So other than Clint, I’m the only one bothered and confused by this?” Steve asked, looking between Natasha, Bruce, and Thor a bit desperately.

“I have known my brother a long time,” the thunder god said, with some mild exasperation. “I am no longer so easily surprised; although I did not need this during a meal, to be frank.”

“I’ve been in stranger relationships,” Natasha said, with a shrug. “And done things under breakfast tables, polite company be damned.”

“I’m just immune to being surprised by anything in this tower at this point, and kind of find it amusing when you’re embarrassed and Clint is annoyed, because I’m a little bit of a not good person that way,” Bruce said to the super-soldier. “Also I’ve had way weirder and more embarrassing things happen to me personally during breakfast for my appetite to be affected by this. Also, I know Tony well enough I’m not actually shocked, and Pepper is usually quiet and unobtrusive compared to the rest of us. You should never think you _really know_ the quiet ones, Steve. We’re the scariest, deep down.”

“Thank you, Bruce,” Pepper said softly, smiling a little.

“Okay...” Steve said, calming down a bit. “So they’re just... they’re still just crazy within their own usual parameters, but not destructively so?”

“I mean them no harm, unless they ask me for a little,” Loki offered helpfully. “I do promise you that.”

“Noted,” Tony murmured.

The super-soldier made a face, but then sighed. “Sorry, then, I guess. Uhm. Culture shock, on my part, sorry, but please guys, not during breakfast ever again, while at this table at least.”

“We’ll try, but no promises,” the inventor responded, and Loki gave a curt nod, along with Pepper, in mutual agreement.

“You’re all ridiculous, for the record,” Natasha said dryly.

“Trust me, Natasha, we know,” Pepper said, smiling a little more brightly, and just a little wickedly mirthful.

The rest of breakfast passed in relative peace.

 

~~

 

Loki hadn’t honestly been expecting to be pushed up hard against a wall in Tony’s private lab not long after the pair of them strolled in. Pepper had been called away for an urgent meeting, which she resented clearly enough that the trickster was sincerely curious to see how she would handle a room full of people inclined to expect politeness and cooperativeness from her. He had been a bit occupied with such thoughts, until the mad inventor’s mouth had crashed up against his own, fierce and sudden and so good Loki barely noticed his head hitting the wall with a sharp thud, because he was too busy getting his hands under Tony’s shirt.

Moaning low and pleased at the unexpectedly fierce attention, Loki let himself be steered, enjoying the feel of the inventor’s hands greedy and intent upon thorough exploration. He was not carelessly rough, not marking him, but firm as he would be with any of his machines, feeling the lines of him, memorizing shape and texture and responsiveness with purpose, taking his time. Loki felt the single-mindedness of that attention, the total absorption of the mad engineer’s focus upon him, with all his senses, and felt like he was being inspected by someone inclined to _own_ him, in a way that made his breathing hitch.

The inventor pulled back from the kiss, “Catching on?”

“You are so unfairly perfect for me,” the trickster panted. “How is this not a trap?” His hands, where they gripped the other man’s waist, squeezed a bit convulsively.

“Because we’re all ensnared, Loki,” Tony replied, in soft but dangerous tones. “My whole life, and my empire, my world, is a lot briefer than yours, and I should suspect maybe you’re playing a long game, but then I see how you light up, just watching little things we do, hearing things we say, and looking like we’re everything you never knew you wanted.”

“Y-you are,” the god rasped. “It shouldn’t be possible, we shouldn’t be poss-” He cut off when the inventor kissed him again, deep and quick and dirty enough to make them both shift their hips with it, to roll their hips together a little more effectively.

Then Tony pulled back, breathing a little harder, “You’re the mage, here. Don’t three impossibles make one effective and breathtaking highly improbable?”

A ragged moan escaped the trickster’s throat. “I love your brain.” He undulated his hips in a maddening manner, just to make the other man gasp and curse. “And you’re very right. Remind me to explain how sentient life and psychic energies generated by it form the fabric of the astral plane, and how it is folded around reality itself like a thin shield of self-fulfilling expectations, irreparably altering the nature of the universe, and that magic and mages exist in small part because of the existence of sentient being who time-travel.”

Tony stared at him, wide-eyed for a moment. “ _You_. I _like_ you. I almost want to hate you, you’re so perfect, but then you make me forget why because I’m too busy staring at your mouth and thinking the only thing hotter than the words from it would be stealing them from you, and that I’m so allowed to do that.” He cupped the trickster’s erection through the fabric of his jeans, and smiled hungrily at the low gasp Loki gave against his mouth. “So, Silver-tongue... I think it’s your turn to kneel.”

The god chuckled, low and pleased, his hands sliding slowly down Tony’s back, under his shirt, and then down the back of his jeans to cup his ass, squeezing fondly. “Did you feel neglected at the table, darling?”

“I felt turned-on and appreciative and like I wanted to fuck your mouth.”

Loki nipped at his lower lip, then lifted him off the floor by a couple of inches, by means of the firm grip he had on Tony’s buttocks, and strode forward a few steps very quickly even as the inventor made a slightly-dismayed noise of complaint, until Tony felt the edge of one of his work tables pressed against him, cold and steadying, right at the indent where his thighs ended and the curve of his ass began. “You will need something to hold you up, and to hold onto,” Loki assured.

“You’re very cocky.”

“With good reason.” His hands released their hold and moved forward to unbutton, unzip, and pull down Tony’s jeans. He bit gently at the engineer’s mouth once more before lowering gracefully to his knees and enjoying the way Tony sucked in a breath reverently at the sight.

Burning with anticipation now, the inventor struggled to stay still as Loki removed each of his shoes, and pulled those jeans the rest of the way down in one quick yank, pushing them aside when Tony stepped out of them. Then the god spread Tony’s thighs a bit wider and nuzzled right at the base of the inventor’s cock, humming approval as he examined it closely, and began to map the underside of it from base to tip in maddeningly small, but ridiculously hot and wet, little licks, so slow and unhurried Tony was already panting hard by the time the god had finally reached the head of his cock.

The inventor then gave a small cry as Loki’s mouth wrapped around the head and sucked too-gently, the tip of his tongue firm and almost rough when it dragged along the slit, such that Tony felt like that tongue was rasping over every single nerve in his body from the inside out. Then the suction increased and that tongue swirled down along all the flesh he’d just marked along the underside of the inventor’s cock as that mouth descended along his length, slowly engulfing him.

Tony gripped the edge of the worktable hard as his hips tried to jerk forward only to find the trickster’s hands had braced for that, and were holding him pinned, unable to move against the god’s superior physical strength. The inventor’s own strength had increased, post-apple, but he hadn’t been honing his physique with constant fighting in heavy armor for centuries; that, paired with how Loki swallowing around him halfway down made his knees weaken a little, put Tony at a significant disadvantage.

Loki’s eyes had fluttered shut earlier, but fell open again now, staring up at the mad inventor as he took the last few inches of the inventor’s length into his mouth, his lips meeting Tony’s groin, and swallowed again, as the flat of his tongue dragged roughly up, causing the inventor to moan his name prettily, so he rewarded Tony by a quick repeat of the motion and a low hum.

“Ff-fuck, Loki, holy shit you’re so good,” the engineer rambled, breathless and voice shaking. Then the god began to bob his head smoothly up and down the mortal’s length while his tongue––Tony was losing track of what that tongue was doing, but the roughness of it, despite being more usually slick and velvet-smooth, took his breath away and had him trying to writhe, but was still kept mostly-immobile by Loki’s grip on his hips, causing the stream of curses and compliments falling from Tony’s mouth to become wordless sounds of frustration and pleasure.

Only once the inventor had given up, and stopped struggling, instead going back to trying very intently to stay still as he held Loki’s gaze and watched in awe for a few long and glorious minutes of being served on the god’s own terms, did the trickster let up his hold on the inventor’s hips, instead gripping Tony’s wrists hard, keeping them in place so that Tony still couldn’t reach out.

He could, however, finally fuck that mouth like he’d wanted.

Tony rocked in time with the tempo Loki had already set, for a while, amazed how effortlessly the god took him in. While the trickster might have a size advantage, it wasn’t a vast one; Tony almost matched the god’s length, with only a little less girth, and yet Loki’s throat took in that length eagerly, swallowing around him every now and then just to draw sounds like small screams from the mad engineer’s throat. He even kept it up as Tony sped up the pace, pushed in harder, taking and almost punishing. Loki kept up, tongue still swirling, moving with him and humming, with an occasional moan as he visibly rolled his own hips a little, so the denim gave his own erection a little friction.

It was seeing that writhing, and just how painfully tight those jeans looked, and Loki’s breath hitching as he moaned around his cock and swallowed tight too, that sent Tony over the edge all at once, and he came so hard his vision whited out for a moment and only the god’s hands again gripping his hips, this time holding them up and pushing him back to perch on the table, kept him from collapsing as his legs gave out.

He did scream just a little when Loki swallowed around him one last time before pulling back, his cock so hyper-sensitive that that, and the slow drag of Loki’s mouth releasing him, still sucking, made tears prickle at the corners of his eyes and his whole body flush with too-good jolts of pleasure that were also acutely painful and sharp: too much, too soon.

But he perversely wanted more, and his hips arched up accordingly.

Loki was panting hard against his thigh. “You held out longer than I expected. I almost began to suspect I’m losing my touch.”

“I’m greedy. That was too good to give in and give up, but damn you’re too good,” Tony moaned softly, letting himself lean backwards until he lay splayed out on the cold metal table, still shivering with intermittent tremors of after-shock.

Then Loki was in front of him, opening his own jeans quickly, pressing close and wrapping his hand around _both_ of them.

Tony muffled the next scream, his back arching into the too-strong sensations as he trembled, boneless and staring up at the mad god in shock. “T-too much, Loki please, _f-fuck_.” He was shuddering with it, then, as the trickster began stroking them together, tight and a little dry, the way only eased by the lingering wetness of the inventor’s cock and the pre-come dripping from Loki’s. “Hurts it hurts.”

“Do you really want me to stop?” Loki asked, his hand stilling.

Despite himself, the inventor whined, “N- _no_.”

He was rewarded by Loki beginning to rut his hips against the grip of his own hand, as it kept moving up and down both of their cocks, his hand moving to accommodate each thrust, and make sure the pressure was distributed evenly along the way, fit to make them both writhe with it a little.

Tony was making utterly incoherent sounds, then, his hips jerking uncoordinatedly, whether in attempt to get away or get more, he was no longer sure. The pain was fading as he recuperated, but he was still just a bit too sensitive and Loki was a bit too rough, and with more slick this would’ve been all bliss, but something about the rasp of it, the too-harsh application of pleasure, kept him on the knife-edge between too much and never enough and it was far too intensely good to stop.

“You look magnificent like this, Tony,” the god rasped. “You’re all a wreck and you’re loving it. Every.” A particularly hard thrust. “Single.” Another, this one with a wicked grind that pressed the inventor’s lower back flat against the table. “Second.”

Screaming Loki’s name harshly, Tony came again, his every nerve on fire, and almost missed the way the god’s own expression shattered open with bliss and possessiveness as he came hard too, just watching him, their hips continuing to rock together until Tony’s eyes watered slightly, and Loki stopped due to his own acute discomfort, both of them trembling.

“Holy fuck,” Tony panted. “How’d that... just... fuck.” Then he felt the god of lies lifting his legs up and hooking them over each shoulder. “You’re fucking k-kidding me, right?” he moaned weakly.

“I’m slick enough with our come, I believe, and you look so good, Tony, please,” he murmured, stroking himself back to hardness with a low groan.

“The myths were right about you being insatiable, fuck.”

“Is that a ‘no’?”

Tony thought about it. His abused dick might have twitched with interest. “How do gods get anything done, without refractory periods to make you know when to stop?

“The benefits of longevity alone, I think. Otherwise we really would have no time to do anything else, most likely,” the trickster deadpanned.

“How this ever worked for our other selves before apples got involved, I don’t even know. You must’ve been frustrated a hell of a lot.”

Loki snorted. “Well, Pepper, at least, seems to shamelessly enjoy multiple orgasms in a row without pause. I suppose I must have distracted myself with her until you were again ready to join in.”

Chuckling helplessly, the inventor still sucked in a pained breath at the feel of Loki’s hand, grip tight, stroked up his length from base to tip. Then he realized it was to collect more slick, which then got rubbed against his opening as the god hummed questioningly. “F-fuck. Yeah, do it.” He then groaned as two fingers slid into him, and began to open him up roughly. “Your mouth is unfair, your fingers are unfair, your legs will be the death of me, fuck, Loki, you just-” He was cut off, thankfully for his own pride, by a surprisingly slow and tender kiss, very at odds with the hasty preparation from Loki’s hand. When those fingers pulled back a few moments later, and the trickster’s cock pushed into him slow but inexorable, Tony was grateful for the distraction of that clever mouth, as he focused on it to keep himself from tensing up at the faint burn of being stretched so wide and penetrated so deeply.

Of the few previous male lovers he’d had, over the years, none of them had measured up to Loki in size, and something about that made Tony feel doubly wrecked by every inch, once the god had finally slid into him to the hilt, breathing hard and hot as they kept kissing for a long minute, letting the inventor adjust.

“You feel so exquisite,” Loki moaned quietly, almost in a whisper, when the kiss finally broke, rolling his hips hard forward, pushing in that little bit deeper.

Tony grunted, realizing acutely that he was still more sensitive than should be comfortable, and the jolt of pleasure and pain from that thrust made his entire body jerk.

“Are you alright?” the trickster asked, becoming very still.

“M-more than. Don’t dare fucking stop.”

“You’re certain?” Loki inquired, genuinely concerned.

Tony glared up at him, but couldn’t help smiling just a little in response too, especially once he gripped the edge of the table for leverage enough to rock his hips  away and up and then push back down hard, driving Loki’s cock still deeper into him and making them both moan. “Yeah, I’m sure, now fuck me.”

“Oh yes,” Loki growled, bracing his hands on either side of Tony’s neck as he pulled his hips back, his wrists applying a bit of pressure against the inventor’s shoulders and holding him more firmly pinned in place when he thrust back in, hard and merciless.

Gripping the table-edge still harder, Tony lost track of himself, aware only of the push-and-pull drag of Loki inside him, fire and pressure and friction focused right against his prostate, and the hungry, almost awed look on the god’s face where Loki was watching him come apart at the seams.

They didn’t last long, both still sensitive from their previous orgasms and far gone on each other’s enthusiasm and hunger. Tony was painfully hard between them, getting only teasing friction from the trickster’s abs, to the point he wanted to beg for more, but couldn’t form coherent words anymore, the heat of arousal a tight-coiled thing low in his stomach and feeding off each thrust and Loki speeding up the pace, looking like he was about to lose it himself.

“Come for me, like this,” the god rasped.

“C-can’t,” Tony moaned, after almost half a minute trying to force himself to form any kind of verbal response. “P-please,” he added, and even to himself, his voice sounded wrecked. “Loki, please.”

“You’ve come at my hand, you’ve come down my throat,” the trickster hissed, his own voice unsteady. “Now I want you to come just from my cock.”

A ragged moan tore from Tony’s throat at that. “Then f-fuck me harder.”

The reaction that inspired caused the table to move backwards several inches, scraping across the floor loudly. It continued to inch back, forcing the trickster to step up closer ever couple of strokes as Tony arched and almost yowled, knuckles white where he gripped the table-edge so hard it groaned and dented.

Tony came so hard he blacked out for a few seconds, almost achieving something like and out-of-body experience, except he was _so very_ **_not_** detached from the sensation of his muscles spasming through his thighs and abdomen, the ache as that made him tighten and clench around Loki’s length a little painfully, and the slowing of Loki’s now-smoother thrusts––the way further slicked by more of the god’s come––as the trickster rode them both through their climaxes until he finally had to stop.

Coming back down was very floaty and almost a bit dizzying, for both of them.

“We are going to have the absolute best angry make-up sex in the future, aren’t we?” Tony croaked, after they had both been slumped immobile on the table for a few minutes. Well, Tony was on the table. Loki was mostly using him as a full-body pillow.

“I will try to infuriate you enough to earn an opportunity to find out before the end of the week,” Loki groaned.

Tony giggled helplessly at that. “Before we do that, I have an idea.”

“Oh?”

“You’ll like this.”

He did.

 

~~

 

Pepper was still fuming from the meeting, and how very little of actual importance there had been for such an “urgent” occasion, and her personal assistant Ben was still apologizing for having been unable to deter them from demanding she be present, when she spotted the email from Tony.

The subject line was “3 rounds in the lab” and the body text was simply “Thinking of you <3” but the really significant part was the attachment: a compressed file named “NSFW”. Pepper felt suddenly very hot under the collar.

“Are you alright, Miss Potts?” Ben asked hesitantly.

She looked at him sharply, recalling advice from jump 97 all of a sudden, and considering the whole idea with all seriousness.

Pepper did usually like Ben, and he did his job effectively but not quite as well as Pepper herself had, as Tony’s assistant, but that was an unfair comparison, generally. He paid attention to detail very well, was both creative and organized when she put him in charge of projects, had excellent taste, and he was sharp-witted and astute as well. It was only his lack of steely, stubborn and unrelenting determination, when arguing with others in very high positions within Stark Industries, which sometimes bothered her.

It would be easy enough, she reasoned, to move him over to PR, particularly putting him in charge of the events-planning team, where his talents would be put to great effect without the need for him to regularly confront the sort of powerful and immensely stubborn people his position, as Pepper’s assistant, _inevitably_ put him in direct and uncomfortable conflict with. She could even give him a bit of a raise.

Loki was grounded, anyway. Let him shadow Ben for a week, maybe two... if he was interested. Clearly he wasn’t bored yet, left in the tower with Tony and Tony’s lab, but the inventor really did need to work on that decryption and speed it up if possible, and would be needed out of the tower and the country just next week, for a series of deals in and around China that they had been preparing for, for a long time before the Traveler and Loki had been dropped into their lives.

A bored, trickster god in Avengers tower was such a terrifying idea, even without his magic factored in for the first week.

Pepper smiled at Ben, soft and polite. “I’m fine. I just had an idea, though. We should discuss it, actually.”

 

~~

 

The mad engineer and the god of mischief did eventually get down to more productive activity down in the lab, for most of the rest of the day, discussing the events mapped out for Pepper and the Avengers, Asgardian royalty, Loki himself, and a dozen others, show in the data the Traveler left them. They mapped out three major plans, based primarily on the most successful timelines that their own was most similar to (major events had to match: the Casket of Ancient Winters residing again in Nifelheim instead of Jotunnheim, Asgard no longer having such blind faith in Odin and Thor both after Loki’s time on the throne, current the state of affairs on earth between Dr. Doom and Hydra and S.H.I.E.L.D., the Avengers all knowing about Coulson not actually being dead, and several others) with various fail-safes to keep things on track over the next few years.

“Apparently, the scar on his forehead, that you also had in Jump 97, is from Doom,” Tony mused. “Do we... want to stop him kidnapping me, since we know it’ll happen? You and Pepper destroying his almost-everything is sort of a major event in all these time-lines, and we don’t know how changing it would really affect things from there forward.”

“We will make efforts to prevent it,” Loki said. “If we can, we prevent it.” His tone then turned icy and poisonous. “If not, I will lay waste to him and make him pay.” 

Tony supposed that shouldn’t make him feel a little bit shiny, and a little bit warm-and-fuzzy inside, respectively. Nor should it be a turn-on. But it was. “Okay, then.”

The god looked at him, then, surprised a little by the warmth in his voice, and intrigued by the slight wickedness of the inventor’s smirk.

Tony stared right back. “You’re hot when you’re protective.”

Loki smirked himself, in response to that. “So are you.”

They were in the middle of dissecting the relative importance of a particular Kree-and-Skrull battle uncomfortably close to the earth, set to happen within the next three months, and whether they should possibly defuse or relocate it, when Pepper entered the lab.

“You both skipped lunch,” she chided, upon sidling up to the worktable, squeezing her own shoulders between Loki’s on the left, and Tony’s on the right. Neither man made any move to actually get more distance, apparently content to be pressed together with her. Pepper admired the 3-D projection of  the events-map they were working on. So many events, separated into a dozen different colors to indicate which timelines they represented, some events glowing brighter than others to indicate importance, linked by narrow threads when two or more events were related to or possibly dependent upon one another: the vividness of the threads also indicating just how vital or non-vital those links between events were. “Wow, this looks complicated.”

“It is,” Tony sighed. “We’re scheduling wars throughout half the galaxy, making and breaking treaties... There’s so much knowledge here, so much we now know about where all these different things are going, it’s a bit ridiculous how much power this gives us.” He frowned a bit deeply. “I know I like playing god, but seriously, this is some shit.”

“Indeed,” Loki concurred. “It makes planning easier, but choosing the path forward far more puzzling, given just how many choices are here available, in so very many directions...”

“Then we need to narrow it down,” Pepper said, “and not over-plan. Don’t plan further ahead than this year, unless events in this year have direct and profound bearing on ones to happen in the next. Also, has JARVIS already done calculations to find out how inevitable some of these are, rather than having us guess relative importance and potential capacity to alter? I know there’s got to be secretly less wiggle-room than we might think there is, just looking at... all of this.” Her hand waved in an all-encompassing gesture, around and through the projected hologram.

The inventor and the god exchanged glances a bit sheepishly.

“You hadn’t thought of that, had you?” She shook her head at them. “I know it’s a cornerstone of both of your personalities that you have a desperate need to believe you can do absolutely anything if and when it turns out you might need to, but you also know your limits. I know you both do,” Pepper chided.

“Do what the lady says, JARVIS,” Tony said.

“Beginning calculations now. Given the sheer amount of raw data and the programs required, a new map should be fully rendered by tomorrow morning.”

“Excellent,” Pepper said. “Tony, you’re taking us out to dinner.”

Both of them did a swift double-take, at that.

“I can’t alter my appearance, in my current state,” Loki said quietly.

She shrugged. “I don’t want you to. Also, I want to employ you: also as yourself.”

The trickster stared at her, sincerely baffled. “Pardon?”

“My current personal assistant doesn’t quite have enough spine, and you come very strongly recommended for the position.”

“He’s not exactly that difficult to recognize, his face wound up in the papers, Pep, he-” He stopped, eyes widening. “Oh sweet Tesla, you’re brilliant.”

Pepper beamed at him, patting his arm. “Good on you.”

“I’ve missed something,” Loki said, sounding a bit lost.

“We’re a reformed former weapons-making company, which now is associated with the privatization of world peace through first Iron Man, and then the Avengers, and also containing war and destruction worldwide through investments in infrastructure and various investigative groups in poverty-stricken and war-torn parts of the globe,” Pepper said, cool and professional. “We’re providing clean energy to large sections of this country and are already branching out to a few others, and we are responsible for securing most of the U.S. government, and other governments of more than half the United Nations, against cyber-terrorism and hacking. Even S.H.I.E.L.D. systems are using operating systems Tony has designed. Stark Industries is a major protective force in this world, and we want to hire you, the god of lies, as personal assistant and thus sort of co-captain to, our CEO. And you will excel at it.” She raised her eyebrows. “That’s good for your personal PR, and earns us points for your ‘redemption’ as well as making us the only business on earth successful and powerful enough that a god is willing to be our employee, rather than our master. You’ll be a press sensation for a while, but we can control how much of a scandal is better by brute-force sincerity keeping everyone on their toes.”

The god of lies’ mouth had fallen open slightly before she was half-finished, and remained open a few moments after until she reached up and touched the underside of his chin, lightly closing it for him.

“You’ll need to shadow my current assistant for a few days, to get the lay of the land, but I’m sure you’ll learn quickly enough,” Pepper said. “Are you interested?”

Loki took gentle hold of her wrist, and kissed her palm reverently. “I am beyond interested, darling Pepper. I am _utterly ensnared_.”

She smiled, slow and sly. “Good. Now... to dinner. JARVIS, hack S.H.I.E.L.D. enough to find out all we need to know about getting Loki legal documentation as a legal extraterrestrial resident within the United States, and get him a water-tight Visa, passport, and diplomatic immunity status before the night is over, please?”

“Yes, Miss Potts.”

Tony kissed her temple. “I love when you’re devious.”

“I believe I do, too,” Loki murmured.

“We might have a suit for you upstairs,” Pepper said. “JARVIS had sufficient scans of you that we had your measurements, and a couple of days for our preferred tailor to work up a few things, given we weren’t sure how much of your magic you’d have left, if and when you came back.”

“I’d wondered about the jeans,” the trickster murmured.

“Those too,” Tony admitted, eyes appreciating the fit of them openly.

“I’ve made reservations at Le Bernardin,” Pepper said.

The inventor’s eyes widened a little. He smiled helplessly, covering his fave with one hand as he chuckled, feeling ridiculous for how sappy this would seem in retrospect. “Pep.”

“We’re dating him. Might as well be consistent in first-date restaurant for both of you,” she chided. “I’m not doing separate anniversaries, if we keep at this. So mark the occasion.” She kissed him briefly, and leaned into Loki’s space seemingly intent on the same, but paused, smiling soft and flirtatious. “No masks, for you.”

Loki swallowed thickly, trailing fingertips along one cheekbone, down her cheek, and then stopping to lightly cradle her jaw in his hand. “You’re brilliant, Miss Potts.”

“Yes. I am.” She kissed him then, brief and playful. “Now lets get you both dressed.” She took hold of their wrists and dragged them out of the lab.

She noticed the two men exchange a few glances as the elevator doors closed, but wasn’t entirely prepared for Loki to catch her mouth and walk her abruptly back to the––that wasn’t a wall. That was, in fact Tony between her and the wall, and he was doing things to the back of her neck with his mouth and trailing hands under her suit-jacket to start unbuttoning her shirt as Loki’s mouth–– _oh that mouth_.

The CEO was still more distracted when he pulled back and trailed kisses down her throat, across her collarbone, and down further still, greedy hands now under her open-but-not-untucked shirt, hungry for skin. Tony then took light hold of her chin, tugging up and to one side so she could slide a bit down his front and he could lean his head over her shoulder to kiss her, his flavor mingling with Loki’s on her tongue as the god of mischief’s tongue flicked under the edge of her bra’s demi-cups, teasing first one nipple, enough to make her shiver, and then the other, before his mouth trailed down still further, and he had to kneel.

Feeling the god’s clever fingers pushing up the hem of her skirt, a small moan of anticipation escaped her before she could help it. She didn’t even notice the elevator doors opening again, the penthouse far from her mind as Loki Silver-tongue nuzzled at her stomach and pulled her panties off, letting them trail down her legs until she could step out of them. Then he pushed her skirt up further and leaned in to taste her.

Pepper shuddered at the hot brush of his tongue from the base of her entrance, up between her outer and inner lips both, only for his mouth to settle over her clit and engulf it in warm heat and pressure and undulations of his tongue that made her struggle to breathe.

She had to break the kiss with Tony to stand any chance of avoiding accidental self-suffocation, once those long fingers pushed into her too, and began lazily stroking all the sweet spots he’d mapped out just that morning. Little breathy moans escaped her helplessly and shivers rolled through her entire body, as Tony purred compliments in her ear, about how brilliant and gorgeous and perfect he found her to be, and how messy and lovely she looked now. The inventor’s hands roamed her front, slow and unhurried, and his mouth, when not whispering, was softly devouring the sides of her neck.

It was no wonder she came apart so fast, shuddering hard with it, feeling Tony hard behind her and seeing Loki’s jeans struggling to contain him. She gasped and almost screamed as Loki’s tongue didn’t let up, as he carried her crashing through one orgasm and almost immediately building up for a second, despite whimpering in discomfort until the hyper-sensitivity became more of a turn-on than a detriment, the way Loki used it, speeding up the efforts of his fingers and his tongue flicking across her clit in smaller, quicker little motions instead of the concentrated whorls of before, not applying further suction yet.

“Oh fuck, oh Loki, you’re––” Her voice cracked and rose into a high cry as she came again, and only remained upright thanks to Tony’s arms around her tightening to support her. She trembled and reached down to tug at the god’s hair, to pull him away, but Tony grabbed her wrist and purred in her ear: “One more. Just like me, today.”

Abruptly recalling the video footage sent to her, she gave a low, almost growling moan as Loki used a third finger and went back to merciless swirling tongue against her almost-sore clit and sucking. “T-Tony-”

“Did you like it?”

“Hell yes, I liked it,” she panted, her voice tremulous. Her hips rolled a little at something Loki did with those damnably clever fingers, making her clench and spasm and she couldn’t tell if it was an after-shock, or a prelude, or if it even mattered anymore. “Loki, fuck, do that again.” He obliged and her head lolled back onto Tony’s shoulder, with a low keen.

“I did too,” Tony told her. “Still sure you want to be in the middle?”

She uttered an incoherent series of syllables, pitch growing higher at the end.

“Damn, how’d you get her to make that noise?” the inventor inquired, a little breathless himself, now.

“Please, please on’t make him talk yet,” Pepper begged shamelessly, her hips now steadily rocking down against his hand eagerly, though her legs were starting to shake again.

Tony chuckled soft against her skin and did the unfair: he nipped at her left earlobe and suckled a tender spot just below it that sent his dear CEO trembling with a strangled moan. In conjunction with Tony’s attentions and Loki’s both, she came once more, long and shuddering and Loki didn’t let it end fast, keeping her riding high throughout, until she screamed more than once, and he slowed, letting her come down slowly, still occasionally spasming with shivery after-shocks that turned her knees into water. “Your mouth,” she eventually whimpered. “Loki, you need to do that a lot, like really often, like oh my god. I need a bigger desk. One you can fit under comfortably every now and then.”

Tony sniggered against her shoulder and Loki smirked up at her, wiping away traces of her from around his mouth and then licking them off his palm and fingers in a few broad strokes of his wicked tongue. “It would be my pleasure,” he assured.

Seeing the penthouse beyond the elevator doors, Pepper considered her options. Having had a feeling this would happen, she’d made the reservations with a fair amount of pre-date sex time in mind, after all. “I am damn sure, right now, though, that you both need to be in my bed. I call middle.”

Loki’s pupils dilated visibly and Tony swore against her neck, hands gripping her hips now, tight and eager.

“We have time?” the inventor rasped.

“I wanted to enjoy dinner properly, so yes, dear, we have time.”

“You are perfection,” the trickster murmured, straightening her hopelessly wrinkled skirt and rising to his feet.

She kissed him briefly, and then strode past him, casually reaching back under her still-open shirt to unhook her bra, before shrugging out of it and her shirt both as she walked. “Come along, boys.”

“I love when she comes home from meetings that made her mad,” Tony said, and followed her quickly.

“I’ll be sure to allow for a few, now and then,” Loki assured, not far behind him.

“I approve of you,” the inventor responded, with feeling.

The trickster chuckled and closed the bedroom door behind himself.

 

~~

 

Pepper had decided that Loki Lie-smith’s fingers were too talented to be entrusted to anyone so devious without some sort of licensing process, but that Loki would probably get one by application of his tongue either verbally or non-verbally to any and all who stood in his way. They would all fall before him, and probably enjoy the whole process.

She regretted nothing, except perhaps not telling him to speed up the pace when she had still been a bit more verbally capable. He had three long fingers stretching her out, as she slowly rode Tony to the point of driving him quietly mad, especially since Loki had the foresight to cuff the inventor’s hands to the headboard. “L-loki please,” she managed, grinding down and back particularly hard against his hand, in a way that made Tony groan mellifluously.

“You’re certain?” the god purred in her ear, his fingers twisting, putting pressure against a bundle of nerves the redhead hadn’t gotten to know very well in the past, making her keen.

“Do it, or I will end you,” she growled.

“As you wish,” Loki responded, nipping at her shoulder as he lined himself up between her cheeks, his breath catching as he began to push in.

Tony cursed a blue streak disjointedly at the feel of intensified pressure. He could feel every inch that Loki slid into her ass, and thrust his own hips up sharply to get in a bit deeper, and the gasps from both of his lovers told them just how much they both appreciated it.

Once Loki’s hipbones pressed hard against her ass and he was fully sheathed within her, Pepper shuddered appreciatively at the fullness she felt, despite the hint of uncomfortable stretch. She hadn’t done much, in the region Loki was now becoming so intimately familiar with, and particularly hadn’t done anything like this, with two partners. It was a foreign feeling, but so good. Sensing her relaxation into the stretch, Tony began slowly thrusting up into her again and Loki emitted a broken noise against her shoulder in response. Pepper herself felt her mouth fall open and like she should have been crying out, but she had no sound, and scarcely any breath. She reached back and gripped the back of Loki’s neck, arching her body up and feeling him slide out a little, before she pushed back and let out a helpless moan that hardly sounded like herself. “Oh _fuck_.” Her other hand gripped Tony’s waist a bit tighter.

“Pepper,” Loki rasped. “So good, you feel so good.” He took hold of her hips and pulled almost all the way out, leaving her all but whimpering at the loss, then pushed back in swift and bone-shaking despite not being nearly as hard as she knew he could have gone, making her emit a louder sound this time: low and rasping, rolling her hips back helplessly seeking more, from both of them, as Tony sped up his own pace and Loki remained a little less hasty, fucking her more slow and deep, and the contrasting rhythms were somehow wrong and distracting and kept her from settling into either one, each of them shaking her right to the core. Then she raised herself up enough to begin fucking the inventor hard as she could, mostly keeping up with his pace, rolling her hips back hard with each down-stroke, forcing the god to match them, and he did so immaculately enough Pepper couldn’t hold out very long at all, and soon lost herself.

Both men made breathless sounds when she came hard around them, helpless not to follow her soon after, both of them subject to how her muscles spasmed and clenched around them, setting them off as much as each other’s uncreasingly-disjointed thrusts, as they struggled to ride her through it, until the strength left all three of them.

They stilled, panting hard, for a few minutes.

“Shower,” Pepper insisted, and whimpered at the feel of Loki drawing out of her, slow and careful thought he was. She felt hollowed out, and the ache of it was strangely thrilling. “Oh wow, fuck.”

Loki kissed along her spine. “You’re well?”

She nodded. “It kind of... feels really good, but not as good as having you there,” she explained. “I kind of feel filthy, yet deeply satisfied.” She leaned back against his chest, using him as leverage to dismount Tony, who remained limp on the bed, halfheartedly rattling the chain of his handcuffs. “I could use help, here.”

Pepper chuckled and leaned over him, kissing him gently and reaching up to uncuff him. “Shower.”

“I call middle,” he said.

She smirked at him. “As you like.”

 

~~

 

Their dinner date made the tabloids, despite nothing actually scandalous happening at or under the table.

They suspected a love-triangle, as tabloids are wont to do, and Stark Industries’ PR team was ready for them. With the exception of the National Enquirer, only articles lacking the ‘romantic’ angle made it to the presses, after a few calls from Stark Industries’ scariest lawyers.

Then MSNBC had managed to reach out to Pepper Potts for an official comment, and got far, far more than they bargained for when, this time around, she was very cooperative. Rather than her usual polite, cleverly mild and either dismissive or reassuring press-release-sounding responses, she sounded fairly casual and open, albeit still matter-of-fact.

“Yes, he’s a business associate. His name is Loki Lyesmith, and he will be employed as my personal assistant, after a week or two of adjustment for him to learn the lay of the land, and for my current assistant to move into our PR department.”

“Uhm... _Loki_ , you say?”

“Yes. Thor’s brother.”

To say the newscaster was floored would be an understatement. “I’m sorry, Miss Potts, but I’m not longer sure any of the rest of the questions I had planned to ask still apply. You’re suggesting that Stark Industries is hiring a known interplanetary war criminal?”

“He was sent to Asgard for his sentencing and imprisonment. He is no longer imprisoned, and Asgard no longer has any legal hold upon him. He has also since then spent the past three years establishing peace between Asgard and two other realms considered to be their enemies, and becoming a vital figure instrumental to the maintenance of that peace, sufficient to provide him diplomatic immunity. Earth, after all, wants no enmity with Jotunnheim or Nifelheim. He is also working with the Avengers on various universe-saving plans, at present, which will require him to spent most of the next three years here on earth. The plans themselves, of course, are classified, but obviously of a very long-term nature and not requiring constant local upkeep, which will allow him time to work for Stark Industries. I consider him a uniquely valuable asset to our company.”

“His previous criminal actions and record don’t bother or worry you?”

“We are already in the business of redemption where Tony Stark is concerned. What better place, then, for Loki to begin his, in the public eye, here on earth?”

“Oh. Wow,” she gave a low whistle. “That is... wow. You’re good.”

“Yes I am. Do you have any further questions, Ms. Maddow?”

“How is it you trust him?”

“Citizens of Asgard are bound to their word, when they swear oaths. The consequences for oath-breaking include their blood boiling in their own veins, among other things, up to and including death, depending on the severity of the breach of oath. While I won’t comment publicly on what promises have been made, I will state in no uncertain terms that I trust Mr. Lyesmith to work only for the betterment of Stark Industries and our goals, without any villainous intent.”

“How long have you been on such good terms with him?”

“I’m afraid that’s also classified.”

“Would you, and possibly Mr. Liesmith be willing to come on my show?”

“When and where?”

“I think I might be a little bit in love with you, Miss Potts.”

“I’m flattered, thank you, but I believe we’re both already in committed relationships.”

A small, embarrassed laugh escaped the newscaster. “We are, yes.”

“I’ll have my PR department work with your usual people on scheduling an appearance for us. I’m currently not anywhere near my desk.”

“I could tell, based a bit on the laughing I keep hearing in the background. I hope I didn’t interrupt anything?”

“Not particularly no.” Slightly muffled, as though a hand were directing her voice away from the phone. “I want you to know that’s very distracting.” A muffled response from a deeper, slightly teasing male voice followed, but Rachel couldn’t place the voice. It didn’t sound like Tony Stark, though. “Sorry,” Pepper said, returning to the call. “Boys acting out.”

“Oh. Right. That’s a thought. How exactly does Loki get on with the Avengers, all things considered? That can’t have been easy.”

“It went fairly well. He didn’t drop in on all of them out of the blue, per se. There was time for most members of the team to be introduced to the idea gradually, and to have everything he’s been up to since the invasion of New York explained to them to their satisfaction. They aren’t exactly on very friendly terms, and there is some lingering tension, but he works well with them, and no violent incidents have occurred despite him living in the same tower.”

“So that is his primary residence?”

“For the time being. He plans to move out to his own apartment very soon,” she lied easily. No reason to give people with grudges, however well-earned, against Loki for the invasion of New York a big shiny building to target him in.

“How does he get along with Tony Stark, in particular?”

“They’re both very intelligent, and Loki is from a more technologically advanced civilization than our own. Given Loki is also very adept with earth’s technologies, and understands even most of Tony’s fairly easily, they actually get along very well, intellectually. Loki is advancing modern science regularly, whenever Tony manages to spend time with him in Research and Development.”

“So he’ll be aiding Tony Stark in engineering matters, as well as being your assistant?”

“It’s safer to say he has input on private projects and innovation, such as the Iron Man armor, which is technically not part of Stark Industries, but the personal property of Tony Stark himself,” Pepper corrected.

“Ah, I see. Things to dangerous to mass market?”

“By far,” the CEO agreed. There was a low but sharp crashing sound in the background. “What are you-” She cut off abruptly.

Rachel realized, after a long moment, that the other end had muted. She waited a few more seconds. “Miss Potts.”

“I’m sorry, Ms. Maddow, I’m afraid I have to go.” She sounded amused, but a little breathless. “Personal matters.”

“Oh. Okay. Thank you so much for your time, and I look forward to meeting you in person, for the show.”

“It will be our pleasure, I’m sure. Thank you. Bye.”

“Bye!”

 _Click_.

“Oh my god,” Rachel muttered, her hand over her mouth. “I need a drink.”

 

~~

 

Loki’s first day at Stark Industries would have gone so much better without someone attempting to violently kidnap Pepper Potts.

It still wasn’t too bad, though.

“So... your ice powers don’t rely on magic?” she asked lightly.

It was a little hard to hear her over the wind and the sound of sirens from outside, since the Hydra soldiers had destroyed her floor-to-ceiling window. Ben was white as a sheet and being led from the room with an orange shock blanket around him by a couple of paramedics. “No, they do not,” the trickster confirmed.

The room around them still smelled a little bit like smoke and Pepper had some broken glass in her hair and between the collar of her suit-jacket and the collar of her shirt, and a bit between her shirt-collar and her neck too, but she was whole, eyes and veins still aglow.

Loki was solid blue with blood-red eyes, and most of the parts of the room that weren’t scorched had interesting ice-sculptures that weapons and kidnappers were being slowly chiseled out of by S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel. “So this was Hydra?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I thought we had a formula to remove Extremis from your system?”

“I decided to stabilize it instead.”

“Why?”

She half-smirked and took hold of his wrist, bringing his hand to her cheek and sighing in low bliss as he sucked in a breath at the contrast. “Traveler touched my face, like this. It felt fantastic, so I decided to keep it a while and see...” She cleared her throat, and shot him a look. “And see.”

“Oh,” he said softly, his eyes very wide.

“Also, you look gorgeous in blue. If you were wondering.”

He swallowed tightly and opened his mouth to start to respond, then closed it again with an audible click.

“You’re so cute when you’re flustered,” she sighed, rubbing her cheek a bit more against his hand, because she could and it felt wonderful.

“We need... to leave this room so that I can find out how this temperature difference affects the rest of your body,” he said quietly, but with feeling. “And we need to trap Tony between us and see how he likes the contrast.”

Pepper made a faint noise in her throat. “I approve of this plan. Let’s go home.” She pulled her face away, tugging him out of the room by his wrist as he laughed softly.

 

~~

 

Loki was slightly distracted for a few days after that, withdrawn into his own mind more than usual. His lovers seemed to understand, and gave him a bit of space. He had regained a little of his magic, not quite enough to facilitate teleportation, but they noticed him idly carving a seal into the bar countertop with one of his daggers. As soon as he finished it, and cut open one thumb to add a drop of blood, the carving vanished back into the marble like it had never been there at all.

He had apparently left similar seals around the penthouse and the outside of the tower at ground-level, according to JARVIS. All of them vanished as soon as blood was applied to them. Pepper wasn’t sure she wanted to know, or how to really broach the subject. Tony was still running scans of the bar trying to work out what, if anything, had changed; he was too determined to find some evidence, somehow, before he would give in and ask the trickster directly.

Then Loki vanished abruptly the fourth day after Hydra’s kidnapping attempt.

JARVIS had detected him quietly leaving the tower before his lovers awoke, heading north-east into the city. After that, he dropped off the map.

“He’s pulling a you,” Pepper told Tony, who was hacking S.H.I.E.L.D.’s systems to borrow the crazy part of it that scanned cellphone and other camera footage world-wide. It had found the god in Germany. Surely, without much of his magic, it could be useful in that regard again.

“He’s what?” the inventor asked.

“I think he might be after Hydra.”

“It’s a bit early for that, on all the maps, oh you mean because of them coming after you,” Tony rambled, realization dawning. “Uh... shit, JARVIS, did Loki access Traveler files recently?”

“He did, sir,” the AI responded, pulling them up. They were indeed all about Hydra. “I think hiring Loki made Hydra more paranoid than expected. They’re moving a bit faster than in previous timelines.”

“What are they after?” Pepper asked.

“Originally, they don’t come after you or me because of Loki for another couple of years, but essentially they’re really irritated that he got the tesseract taken back to Asgard. They target us in order to try and use one or both of us as leverage to persuade him into bringing it back. In most other timelines except for one, they tried to kidnap you at a time when you didn’t have Extremis, and ‘Lora’ was out of the office causing mischief for Thor on the other side of town, and they succeeded in getting ahold of you four out of five time.”

“What about the other time?”

“That was also the exception one where you _did_ have a stable version of Extremis, but when you tore apart their forces, they went more all-out within... five days. They tried to dismantle Extremis, and nearly killed you, but Loki stabilized you via ice-powers, until I could come up with a fix. In the end, I had to fully remove Extremis for you to have any hope of not exploding without constant frozen Jotunn maintenance,” Tony said slowly.

They exchanged glances.

Just then, alarms went off all through the tower.

“A large warehouse complex near Jersey has just burst into abrupt and complete conflagration, visible for miles around, and on satellite imagery,” JARVIS reported. “The fire, rather notably, seems to be green. Stark Industries satellites now aimed at it do detect a Hydra presence... or did until all of their transportation vehicles just exploded.”

“I think we found him,” Tony mused.

“Yes,” Pepper said. “I’m going to strangle him a bit.”

“He might enjoy it.”

“I don’t care. It will still make me feel better,” she muttered, beginning to pace at Tony donned a suit of armor. She knocked on one of the other suits, to his surprise, and let it engulf her without hesitation.

“To Jersey, then?” he asked.

“Yes,” she responded.

They took off soon after.

 

~~

 

Loki was exchanging heated words with Coulson about containment and highly-obvious unnatural events, by the time the inventor and Pepper both landed near them.

The trickster wore only slightly ripped up jeans, and his shirt was mostly burnt off, and he was bleeding a bit from some shallow wounds on his back and one side of his neck, and there was a lot of dried blood on his hands, going up past his wrists. More smears of it, suggesting a lot of blood-splatter, speckled across his face, neck, and jeans unevenly.

Coulson interrupted one of the god’s arguments with, “Wait, there are still people in there, you’re saying?”

“Well, perhaps a dozen.”

“Still alive?”

Loki looked at the fire, eyes narrowing. “Yyyes. For about the next eight or ten minutes, probably. After that, I can’t promise they won’t start to burn.”

“Then we need to be able to get in there.”

“If I don’t let you? And prefer they burn?” the god asked lightly.

“Diplomatic immunity or no, letting them burn alive goes above and beyond self-defense, whether or not you were actually kidnapped,” the agent answered.

Loki sighed and raised one hand, snapping his fingers.

All of the vivid green flames abruptly went out.

Coulson appeared deeply disturbed.

“Send in your agents, Phil dear, before they escape,” Loki chided.

The agent clenched his jaw, glaring at him for another moment, barely sparing the two Iron Man suits a glance before he turned on his heel, barking orders over his comm system.

Pepper raised her faceplate, crossing her arms over her chest and shooting the god a harrowing look that had Loki looking almost sheepish, folding his bloodied hands behind his back. “Why exactly did you not mention planning to do this?”

The trickster lifted a hand as though to run it through his hair, then seemed to recall all of the blood on it, and dropped it back to his side. “I didn’t want you to stop me,” he admitted lightly. “And this was really, really satisfying and cathartic after having so little magic to work with for so long, though really this didn’t actually require much, with the proper planning, and collecting energy from points around my current locus of control and emotional resonance over the past few days. It was just a matter, then, of aiming it at the right place, which was well-served by letting myself be captured. I still planned to be home before dinner, in fact.”

“Admittedly, this is pretty tidy work,” Tony said lightly.

“Thank you.”

“I’m still angry with you,” Pepper said. “You worried us.”

“I... am sorry, for that.” He stepped closer to them. “I assure you that I have no intention to run anywhere I cannot return to you both from. I did make certain.”

“You’re going to keep doing things like this?” she asked.

“Most likely, yes. I thought this project, being relatively minor and more than within my own capabilities, to be particularly harmless. I considered lying and suggesting I had business in another realm, but I guessed the fire would be a bit of a giveaway. How might I make these sort of things easier on you?”

Pepper sighed. “I’ll think about it. Until then, you need a ride home.”

“Actually, cutting off the spell early has left me with something of a temporary buzz of excess power. It’s not anything I can maintain beyond the next hour, but just for now...” He grinned, and around all three of them, the world vanished and changed angle for a disconcerting moment. When it reappeared, they stood in Tony’s lab.

“I have _so_ missed that,” Loki sighed. “I appreciate vehicular transport, but I have only so much patience, at-” He was unprepared for Tony, as soon as his suit retreated back to it’s storage unit, to grab him by the hair and shove him back against a lab table, kissing him fiercely.

“I love you, and I know this is still all new, but two people important to me getting kidnapped in the same week does not my paranoid psyche put at ease, asshole,” the inventor growled, a moment later.

Loki’s eyes widened and his mouth fell open a little wider. “Oh.”

Realizing that was, actually, the first time he’d said that particular three-word phrase to Loki out loud. “Yeah. That’s a thing, by the way.”

“It’s mutual, and I’m sorry.” The trickster then twitched in surprise at Pepper suddenly pressed flush against his back. She had apparently gotten on the worktable form the other side and sidled up behind him. Her legs bracketed his hips as her fingers wrapped around his throat. He close his eyes and let his head slowly loll back to rest on her shoulder, entirely trusting.

That was surprising enough, along with Loki going altogether pliant between them, utterly submissive, and willing to let them punish as they might please, that cooled Pepper’s ire somewhat. “Oh I _see_ ,” she murmured.

At that, some tension returned to the line of the trickster’s spine, indicating he thought she might be close to the mark and was a little frightened by that thought. He swallowed convulsively.

“I’m not going to punish you for being protective of us, Loki,” she said softly. “I want you to understand that.”

“I do,” he said softly.

“Then you’re going to give me a word you wouldn’t normally use, which you’ll say if one of us goes too far,” she said.

Loki chuckled, a little breathless already. “Coulson.”

Tony snorted. “Admittedly, that’d also be a mood killer, and something I never want to hear you say _accidentally_ in the heat of a sexy moment.”

“Tony, I need you to arrange for him to be held suspended right here by the chain between a pair of handcuffs, facing this table,” Pepper said, calm and cool.

“Ma’am, yes, ma’am,” Tony said, grinning and nipping at Loki’s bared throat briefly before pulling back and getting to work.

“Thank you,” Loki said to her quietly.

“For?”

“Playing along.”

She sighed, stroking his hair. “Wash up. There’s way too much blood all over you, and I plan to apply my tongue to a number of those places.” She patted his hips. “Next time at least leave a note.”

“Yes, m’lady.”

 

~~

 

One week after starting talks with the news network, and given the surge of sudden public interest in Loki, MSNBC devoted the entirety of Rachel’s usual hour, unusually commercial-free, to an interview with Loki Lyesmith, and Pepper Potts, sitting calmly in chairs across from their interviewer’s seat, unperturbed by the various cameras aimed at them from different angles, or even the occasional flash bulb as photos were taken for the website.

Loki wore a very well-tailored charcoal shirt, and a dark green button-down shirt that matched the folded square of fabric in his breast pocket, and a black tie with a golden Yggdrasil tie-pin. His long hair was impeccably smoothed back, and tied in an understated ponytail against the back of his neck. Pepper wore one of her own usual business suits, with respectable pencil skirt and simple black heels; although her pendant earrings, upon close inspection, were white-gold circles the size of dimes, with very fine seals on them. The internet would later magnify press photos from the interview, and point out a few norse runes in the midst of otherwise inexplicable line-work, and conspiracy theorists would run mad with it, suspecting her to be under some variety of evil spell cast by the mad god.

In reality, they were seals of protection, of Loki’s design, which he’d given her on the day of the interview. They also provided resistance against, and ability to see through, persuasive and illusory magics, ironically enough.

“Thank you two for your time with us, here this evening,” Rachel greeted, shaking their hands before sitting down across from them. “It’s an honor to meet both of you.”

“It’s lovely to meet you, as well,” Pepper offered.

“And a pleasure,” Loki added.

“You look a lot less intimidating out of full armor, but somehow not harmless in the least,” the newscaster said to him. “You also look a bit like a Vogue model.”

Loki smiled one of his gentler charming smiles, not flirtatious but still sincerely pleased. “I thank you.”

“To start, I have to ask... do you regret what damages you caused in New York?”

The trickster gave a nod of both understanding and concession. “I do regret the extent of them, and that I did not have means, at the time, to avoid causing them without initiating my own demise. I was utterly selfish in that regard, and do not seek to be forgiven by those who suffered as a result of my actions, which themselves were unforgivable.”

“I’m going to have to ask for some elaboration on that,” Rachel said, eyebrows raising over the rims of her glasses. “What, exactly, would’ve caused your demise?”

Loki nodded. “My actions in New York were the third and final act, in the play I was forced to perform here on earth. The first act began with my arrival in a top-secret S.H.I.E.L.D. base by means of a dangerous alien artifact thought lost forever from Odin’s vaults. It was a power-source, and a very powerful one, with which I had been familiar, from studies of such phenomena in my studious youth. Experimentation conducted upon it had sent a sort of... signal out through the rest of the universe, particularly detectable at the other end of the galaxy where a being called Thanos had been banished by it long ago. Lingering traces of the ‘door’ through which he was pushed still existed there.” He cleared his throat, and offered a slightly apologetic look. “I’m sorry, but this is a rather long story.”

“No please, go on,” the interviewer assured.

“Thank you.” He inclined his head in a nod, briefly. “It was by a series of catastrophically bad decisions on my own part, and destruction of the piece of infrastructure in Asgard known as the bi-frost, which occurred as a direct result of my actions––though my brother Thor was the one who shattered it, he only did so in order to stop me from completion of a grave atrocity during a bout of madness I was under, at the fault of Odin––that I had fallen through a rip in space and time and landed in the place that Thanos dwelt, in the midst of his then-powerful armies.” He grimaced a bit, and clearly hesitated over his next words.

“I did not land well, and was in a highly weakened state, both from exposure to various horrors in the void as well as intense heat and cold which I had used up most of my magic in order to survive prolonged exposure to, and from crashing very hard through solid rock when the falling had finally stopped. From the moment they captured me, I was ... not treated with hospitality, let us say, because I was a unique biological specimen of a race unfamiliar to them, and one of Thanos’ most high-ranking generals, I only knew him as The Other, had a penchant for genetic manipulation.”

Loki’s expression was very solemn, now, his tone carefully distant as he elaborated, “He was, in fact, responsible for the creation of the entire Chitauri race, and curious about the potential my genetic stock might have, for advancing the Chitauri.” He took a very deep breath, seemingly unable to look anyone in the eye. “I was as an animal to him, for experimentation the likes of which is not a subject fit for polite company.”

“You were tortured, essentially,” Rachel said.

“Most civilized creatures would consider it so, yes. My ability to endure damage and pain, extreme temperatures and toxins that would kill other life-forms, and recover from it relatively quickly, was a subject of some fascination to them. They ran many repetitive tests.”

“I’m so sorry you went through that,” she said sincerely, her brow slightly furrowed, but her eyes were still focused on him, and his story. There was not pity in her expression: only thoughtfulness, and slight concern. “Did they give you any chance to explain who you were?”

“The Other never did. It was not for a very long time that any words I spoke were listened to, but as soon as Thanos first appeared in the laboratory I was kept in, I knew precisely what he would want to hear. As such, I got his attention by mentioning his interest in the earth and my own knowledge of his banishment, and was freed from captivity when he realized I knew more about the artifact he was after than he did. I lied about my own motives, to make him think I was manipulatable and single-minded in pursuit of a single abstract goal. Since vengeance was the simplest of obsessions to feign, I told him I was the rightful king of Asgard, betrayed by my kin, deposed, and thrown into the abyss. He concocted a deal he thought would appeal to me: conquest of the earth, which I blamed for Thor’s betrayal, suggesting his loyalty to this world was greater than loyalty to his king, in exchange for Odin’s long-lost trinket, called the Tesseract. In truth, I did want vengeance, but I wanted it against The Other, and I also wanted to arrange trouble for Thanos himself for keeping such a creature alive for so long, and then to be very, very far away from that place, back in the nine realms for preference. As such, I agreed, and planned my betrayal, starting with insisting that the army I would be sent would be all of the Chitauri: every single one of them.”

Rachel nodded thoughtfully and suggested: “And that was because you were planning to come up with a way to destroy them?”

“Just so,” he answered, with a nod. “That was how it began. He did not, however, trust me fully. He armed me with a weapon that was bound to both my psyche, and the tesseract. It monitored my every word and action, and those of anyone it put under its control by means of psychic manipulation, for any signs of my betrayal. Had I been any more obvious in my intentions to never let Thanos get his hands on the tesseract, and indeed to put forth every effort to make the invasion explode in his face quite literally, my will would have been drained out of my skull and my body left with only one order in its head: to self-destruct, and pass on the scepter to a less self-aware pawn, who would complete the opening of the portal for the Chitauri.”

“Wow. Is that... actually true?”

“I swear that it was so,” Loki said.

“A brief aside, for those at home: you’re unable to break promises, correct?” Rachel asked.

“Yes. Oath-breaking, in Asgard, is considered punishable by death, and there is no trial for the offense. It is embedded within the magic of Asgard, woven into air, water, and all, which we absorb throughout our long lives there. If I attempt to break an oath, or swear to something which is untrue, my blood begins to boil in my veins, among other searing agonies, my brain would swell, and if I persisted, or could in no way retract the offense, it could indeed lead to an unpleasant death,” Loki assured.

“Thor also confirmed this to be true,” Pepper added.

“That’s a pretty severe judicial system, up there, by the sounds of it,” said the newscaster. At their thoughtful nods of agreement, she then added, “How exactly did it punish you for your crimes here on earth?”

The trickster didn’t smile, and most wouldn’t notice he had any urge to, but Pepper saw something like amusement in his eyes before he answered solemnly, “I suppose one could say I devoted three long years to public service with no promise anyone would ever attribute the good I did for all the nine realms as anything to do with me, given I was not allowed to be myself, but that would be putting it rather too kindly.” He did offer a small, self-deprecating sort of smile, then.

“In actual fact, I faked my own death saving Thor’s life after he broke me out of prison to stop all of the nine realms from being destroyed, which everyone may remember from his appearances in London around that time. After faking my death, I attacked Odin, put him into a coma-like stasis state, and locked him away under the throne, then pretended to be him for three years. I had plans to reveal myself in perhaps another six months to a year, and humiliate him by systematically proving all of the ways I had done more for inter-realm diplomacy in those three or four years than he has in the past thousand years, including establishing peace with their long-time enemies in Jotunnheim, and opening new pathways between the realms other than the bi-frost to some of the other realms, bringing in an influx of trade and prosperity domestically, as well as in foreign affairs; however, I was brought up a bit short by a series of unexpected events leading me to posses a great deal of information on how to best prevent this universe being invaded by another with very ill intent within about three years, but any more information than that, I fear, is classified Avengers business.”

“Can you explain what is it about this threat that made you turn to the Avengers, despite being their former enemy?” Rachel asked.

“I value my own life, and the universe as a whole. I assure you, my interests in saving the latter are as selfish as the sentiment of the former,” Loki replied.

The newscaster smiled in amusement at that, nodding along. “I guess that’s fair. Miss Potts, all of this information seems familiar to you.”

“I would hardly have hired him without an awful lot of explaining on his part, of his previous actions on earth, and his motives,” she offered. “Tony Stark is valuable to me both professionally and personally, as my friend and my romantic partner, and I’m very protective of him. Also, living with him in the same tower as the Avengers as I do, this was all very pertinent information for me to know, long before there was any consideration of Loki being at all involved with Stark Industries.” She caught Loki glancing at her briefly with the look of a master craftsman admiring the handiwork of another master. To anyone else, it might have looked like respect for his employer, and his being impressed with her, she supposed.

“You also mentioned your interest in Mr. Liesmith’s diplomatic actions, in interplanetary politics?” Rachel inquired.

“Yes. As it’s been explained to me, the realm of Nifelheim is one of the nine realms, but the most distant. It’s in a sort of perpetual winter, and also at its southern pole is a sort of in-between place that both does and sort-of-doesn’t exist, called Helheim, where his daughter is queen. The rest of the world, which is in a state of perpetual winter and thus very icy, is mostly uninhabited save for one nation-state under the rule of a city that doesn’t share its name with outsiders.” 

“Am I right so far?” She looked to Loki, who nodded for her to continue. “They have a monarchy, strictly speaking, but their whole society was founded by three mages, all women, called the Three, and they act as a sort of triumvirate extra-legal governing body for their society: one of them advises the sovereign monarch and their court, spending all time with them, the other travels all through their various towns, always listening to the concerns of the people on their own terms, and the third remains on the outskirts, usually in the wilderness, and acts as their outside-perspective, whom the other two parties must both listen to; they aren’t held to the laws of the land as ordinary citizens, and if a monarch or any other major political figure turns corrupt, or otherwise does more harm than good, the Three will undermine and overthrow them.”

“I kind of want to go there, now,” Rachel mused. “If I wouldn’t freeze.”

“Their queen, and the First of the Three, I found out during my time acting as Odin while within Asgard, but conducting at least half of all foreign diplomacy as myself, are actually kin of mine,” Loki said, “which was quite a relief, actually, given the rest of my biological kin that I had known of up until then were of sort I viscerally loathed.”

“Your... biological kin?” the newscaster asked lightly.

“I was adopted by Odin and Frigga; Thor and I are not actually brothers by blood. It’s a very long story, and not one I’m inclined to get into on national television quite yet, my apologies,” the trickster answered.

“Oh! I see. Sorry, I didn’t know.”

“It’s no problem,” he assured. “Just a complicated personal matter, given that I didn’t know I was adopted for the first couple of millennia of my life, and the revelation didn’t go over very well. Odin and I have been on less than congenial terms ever since then, let’s say.”

“Understandable, really,” Rachel mused. “So you made diplomatic headway with them, I assume?”

“Yes. They are, generally speaking, a very isolationist culture. I presented my case to them regarding Jotunnheim. This... will take explaining, I’m afraid.”

Rachel waved a hand to urge him on. “I really don’t mind. This is fascinating stuff, to me, really it is.”

“The Three are Jotunns, actually, as are all of their people. Jotunnheim itself was not always icy on par with Nifelheim until a radical off-shoot of Nifelheim’s people, all Jotunns with natural elemental powers of an icy nature, stole a powerful relic belonging to the Three, and used it to transport themselves, and a massive amount of mile-thick ice, to Jotunnheim, which they proceeded to ‘conquer’ by means of converting it into a state of perpetual winter, just like Nifelheim, killing millions of people all over that world.” He grimaced slightly. “Their leader was my grandfather, and that whole atrocity was what would eventually lead to wars between Jotunnheim and Asgard, shortly after Odin became a king. He was elected, by other representatives throughout the realms, to execute their leader for his crimes, leaving behind the leader’s son Laufey to rule them, and he was of a vengeful, and very aggressive nature. He went on to try and ‘convert’ the earth similarly with ice, but was stopped by Asgardian forces.”

“And Laufey...” the newscaster trailed off, not sure if she should ask.

“Is now very dead,” Loki said softly, his expression utterly unreadable.

Rachel cleared her throat quietly, and pointedly didn’t ask the obvious question, _so if Laufey’s dad was your grandfather, does that make him your..._ Instead, she said briskly, “So, you and Nifelheim.”

“Yes. I went there, and I returned the stolen artifact used by Laufey and his father before him to fuel their empire, and which had been in Asgard’s keeping after Jotunnheim’s defeat. I then persuaded them that their loss of control over some of the most volatile of their kin laid some responsibility on their shoulders, as a nation and just the Three themselves, for the atrocity of the icing-over of Jotunnheim. The Three have accepted this, and the realm of Jotunnheim, with consent from all kingdoms therein, is now officially under the protection, and guidance of the Three, who are even now working with mages from elsewhere throughout the realms to restore Jotunnheim’s climate. Given how powerful the mages and older magics––older, in fact, than Asgard itself––of pre-ice Jotunnheim were, the Three even believe that there may be survivors, long-preserved in stasis, below the ice.”

“Wow. That sounds... oddly altruistic, for you?” the newscaster suggested.

“Oh yes. Creating lasting peace with Jotunnheim and helping them to recover from an atrocity Asgard’s young king and all the rest of the nine realms could not prevent, and did not think it possible to unmake, for so many years, and thus proving just how bad Odin is at being king, was entirely a selfless act,” Loki purred, smiling a bit more sincerely sharp than he had so far.

Rachel’s eyebrows raised. “Wow. That was really your motive?”

“Also, the... atrocity I earlier mentioned committing, which Thor prevented my completion of, was one I have come to deeply regret,” the trickster admitted. “It was committed against Jotunnheim. I am highly aware that even doing for them all what I now have, and establishing more permanent peace between their world and Asgard, is not enough to make up for the loss of life I caused there.”

“Oh,” Rachel said, a bit stunned. “Wow.”

“That is actually, in part, what I wish to do here in Midgard, to make my amends: improve standards of living, and share my knowledge and resources, in the hopes of making up, in some small ways, for the harm I have done to this world,” Loki suggested smoothly, in full-fledged PR-mode. “Stark Industries is a company which understands trying to make up for costly mistakes of pride and deliberate ignorance, and evolving to change from being known as a place dedicated to the invention and marketing of devices defined to promote death, and instead becoming an innovative force for the protection of peace throughout multiple realms by means of the preservation of life. I am honored to have this opportunity to work with Miss Potts, and Mr. Stark, to build a brighter future for humanity, as they do every day.”

 _Silver-tongue indeed_ , Pepper thought to herself quietly, and then immediately tried very hard not to think about his tongue while on national television.

Rachel Maddow seemed to have less a sexually charged versions of Pepper’s initial thought, looking at the god with the air of someone who sees exactly what political maneuvers were just pulled off there, and was suspicious, but had to admire the skillfully applied techniques involved. “Clearly, you’ll be surprisingly little trouble for their PR department, compared to Tony Stark.”

“I have always been known more for the subtlety and innocuousness of my words, rather than their memorable brashness and bold provocativeness, in most cases,” Loki admitted. “Unless provoking certain people would be easier than being subtle, to achieve certain ends.”

“Like what you sort of did to Odin,” Rachel pointed out.

The trickster shrugged, and neither confirmed nor denied.

“How exactly, Miss Potts, did you come up with the idea to hire him on as your personal assistant?” the newscaster asked, with renewed mild incredulity.

“My current personal assistant is a wonderful man, and I’m happy that he’ll be much better suited to a position with more PR focus, especially when it comes to company events and image, because it’s obvious to me that those are the tasks be both most enjoys, and best excels in,” Pepper began. “It’s not to say he’s at all lacking, but having spent time listening to all Loki has been up to, since New York, and with the opportunity presented by him having time here on earth in need of general day-to-day matters with which to keep occupied, barring very occasional between-realm trips to Jotunnheim, he honestly seemed like a more ideal fit, once the thought occurred to me,” she recounted, lies indistinguishable from truths, with a casual ease.

Pepper continued, “Loki is already very familiar with different cultures here on earth, and spent some time learning more about our world once he was out of prison and free to move about the realms at will. He’s very astute and his diplomatic experience and overall political savvy give him a natural, excellent sort of business sense. Furthermore, he and I work well together, as we’ve found just generally working with the Avengers on the whole universe-saving project. We have a very effective rapport, and are equally sort of fearless individuals who are good at letting on only what we wish to, and as situations require, when working with challenging personality clashes in others around us, and keeping disparate groups, like the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D., properly focused on, and motivated toward, their goals. So while the thought was... well, I considered it almost as a joke, but then realized it was actually a brilliant idea.”

“And I’m sure not many of your competitors can boast having a god willingly on their payroll,” Rachel mused, looking at Pepper with the same slightly-impressed shrewdness she’d aimed at Loki earlier, though a bit warmer.

“Not that I’m aware, no,” the CEO responded, her smile utterly innocuous.

“What did you first think of the job offer, Mr. Liesmith?” the newscaster asked.

“I was a bit perplexed, actually.”

“Really?” Rachel’s eyebrows raised.

“Being a shape-shifter, and illusionist, I originally presumed I would be hired under a false identity, for the sake of the company’s image, but Pepper, being as brilliant and unapologetically earnest as she often is, told me outright that she wanted me, as myself, very publicly occupying this position. I thought she might be insane, but she made some very persuasive arguments, and I could not resist.”

“Magic. Right,” the newscaster reminded herself: not disbelievingly, but like disbelief in it had been so habitual for a long time––before things like the invasion of New York, and the mystical super-hero called Dr. Strange saving half of Jersey from a horde of nightmare-beasts last year, which all 24-hour news channels had broadcast live throughout the country––that she still had trouble remembering to factor it in as an actual thing. “I hadn’t even considered that. Much though I appreciate your sincerity, as a member of the general public who sort of, really likes not being deceived about the nature of harmless-seeming people in powerful and influential positions in the political and business worlds, why did you not take that route, Miss Potts?”

“Well, for one, it’s the right thing to do. Also, it’s always better to have as few skeletons in one’s closet as possible; all they do for a company is fuel future scandals, and rightfully so, because as a company with as much power and influence as we do have, we _shouldn’t be doing anything we have to hide_. Why do that, when up-front sincerity should be possible? Ever since the regrettable scandals Obadiah Stane had run under all of our noses at Stark Industries for so long, including selling weapons even to terrorists the likes of the Ten Rings, as a company we know there is some doubt about our more private ventures, and our intentions in some cases. I want to make it clear that we _have_ changed.”

She leaned forward in her seat slightly, gesturing more now. “It was never just Tony Stark who needed redemption, after seeing how much damage weapons from Stark Industries had been doing, world-wide, because they were being sold into the wrong hands, and fueling conflicts selectively, for the sake of increasing demand. There is blood on my hands too, for that, when I was responsible for so much of Tony’s public life, and Stark Industries’ image and message, which was all hiding Obadiah’s corruption.”

Her hand extended in a slashing gesture, like she was cutting something down with it. “We’re hiding _nothing_ like that ever again, especially not ‘just because we can’ nor ‘just because it will be easier to spin this for PR’ because that’s what got us into trouble in the first place. I won’t do that again, and for how sincere Loki has been with me, with the Avengers, and how I do see in him a desire to continue to improve and innovate, rather than do more harm, he doesn’t deserve to have to hide. Not when the truth is so important for people to know.” She shot him a look, then, slightly proud and a little affectionate under the professional calm, and saw the trickster swallow tightly, a twitch of a smile tugging at his lips, though he remained otherwise masked for television.

Rachel had a look on her face like she was torn between critically working to see through the marketing in those words, and being genuinely inspired by them. “It’s refreshing to hear someone, especially CEO of a company with the sort of resources that Stark Industries has, so passionate about being genuinely open and honest like that, despite being one of the most unregulated corporations in history governmentally, while also admitting to past mistakes. Thank you, Pepper Potts. You never cease to amaze me.”

Pepper blushed only a little, inclining her head. “You’re an impressive person yourself, Ms. Maddow.”

“I think we’re actually out of time, sadly, but thank you both, again, for coming here, and almost making me cry a little,” the newscaster said firmly.

“It’s been lovely to meet you, Ms. Maddow,” Loki responded.

“It really has. Thank you for having us,” Pepper added, with sincerity.

 

~~

 

Loki managed to maintain an air of slightly aloof reserve until they got to the car, with it’s conveniently tinted windows. The trickster picked up Pepper’s hand, entwining his fingers with hers, and kissed the back of it. “You are wonderful,” he said quietly.

“You’re a class act yourself,” she replied, smiling a little, as he began to kiss her knuckles each individually.

“You are astonishingly good, and I have no idea how I could ever possibly deserve you in my life,” the god went on.

“Loki...”

“You,” he said, kissing her wrist. “Are.” He leaned in and kissed her forehead. “Perfection, Miss Potts.” He then kissed her lips gently.

“Did I miss a memo?” Happy asked hesitantly, from the front seat.

“I’m dating both of them, don’t tell the press,” Loki responded, enjoying how he could _feel_ the heat of Pepper’s skin blushing, this close to her face, and kissing her again, a little more firmly.

“Noted,” Happy said, only a little confused, but not actually very surprised. He proceeded to ignore them, then.

“You are the most earnest liar I have ever met,” he whispered, when she broke the kiss to glare at him a little, causing her mock-ire to evaporate instantly. “You should be impossible, but here you are.”

“So you think you can work with me, manipulating most of the whole world quietly from my office, in small but always vital little ways?” she asked lightly, cupping his face in one hand to keep him close.

“I can think of no more noble undertaking I have ever desired in my entire life, but yes. You are noble, and good, but still more than twisted and sly enough to ensnare the likes of me,” he responded.

“Good,” Pepper said, and pressed her forehead to his. “I want you in my life.”

“I don’t pretend to understand that fully, but I will happily bask in it.”

“I feel the same way about you,” she countered.

Loki laughed, low and content.

 

~~

 

It was during his second week at Stark Industries that Loki met Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes for the first time. The soldier looked him up and down more like he was looking for the best places to shoot than appreciating the cut of his suit.

He was having drinks with Tony, who had apparently explained all of the things, at the bar in the penthouse.

“I’m no longer actually that surprised, all of a sudden,” he said flatly.

Loki wasn’t actually sure what to make of that reaction. “How so?”

“I don’t like men myself, but it’s clear you’re a pretty man, you have style, and even from here I can tell you’re just the sort of crazy nobody sane should mess with,” Rhodey responded, his tone blithe. “Sit down, have a drink. Where’s Pepper?”

“She is helping Natasha and Rogers with some Avengers related event-planning which is of no interest to me,” he said, with a shrug. “Not after talks with Japanese investors half the day, in any case. It all go so much better without that _one_ lunatic from the Osaka company; the rest of his associates are perfectly sound. I’m considering requesting Natasha assassinate him, for the good of both companies.” He sat down calmly a respectful distance from the Colonel, accepting a drink when Tony mixed one for him, where he stood behind the bar.

“She doesn’t accept corporate contracts,” the inventor said lightly.

“Or private ones from extraterrestrial non-humans,” Loki sighed, like that was her excuse when he asked for her to kill someone for him on a previous occasion; it probably was. “I was pinning my hopes on her, for this. Not that I couldn’t do it myself.”

“Would you?” Rhodey asked lightly

The trickster considered. “No, but I might do something horrible to his reputation to get him fired. It would be less dull than just killing him untraceably.”

The soldier side-eyed him a bit. “You’re a little messed up.”

“I appeal to him, to be fair,” Loki gestured toward Tony, smirking a little. “And I’m not Pepper Potts. You were expecting sanity?”

“I suppose hoping for sanity there _would_ be like hoping for two non-magically-influenced lightning strikes in a row, hitting the exact same person,” Rhodey admitted, looking a bit amused. “So I’ll give you that one.”

“That’s happened to me,” Tony said.

“You fly through thunderstorms in a metal suit,” the Colonel pointed out. “You’re not a normal example. Of _anything_.”

“I rather appreciate it,” Loki mused.

“Of course you do. You’re abnormal by the interplanetary standards even more than he is,” the Colonel responded, sounding amused. “And you enjoy it.”

“That’s a fairly accurate assessment, I suppose.”

“Hurt either of them and I’ll kill you, for the record,” Rhodey said.

“Careful, Rhodey, you’ll make me swoon,” Tony deadpanned.

“If I did so, I’d let you,” Loki responded to the soldier, causing the inventor to drop the top half of his shaker set with a loud clatter.

The soldier also looked a bit stunned. “Damn, they got you hook, line and sinker in just over a week?”

“Yes,” Loki said. “It’s deeply disturbing, but I find it highly enjoyable.” He looked at Tony, then, with a wicked smirk, and found the man staring at him a little wide-eyed and pale. “What?”

“You better fucking _not_ ,” the inventor snapped suddenly. “If it’s ‘either’ of us, the other one will kick your ass and we make up as long as we’re all still alive. If it’s ‘both’ then maybe Rhodey and/or JARVIS, are allowed to try to kill you. That’s so the deal here. I want that clear for both of you,” Tony said seriously, accusing finger-waving at both of them.

“Is this... is this an official contingency plan?” the soldier asked lightly.

“Well... if Pepper or I fuck up and get him hurt, we can expect a thunder god to threaten us a bit, or his daughter, or both, depending on the severity of our fuck-up,” Tony said. “You and JARVIS are the only equivalents to family Pep and I really have aside from each other, but since you’re protective of two parties in this equation, I figured maybe I should specify for you that you don’t get to be first-response?”

He snorted. “This is the weirdest conversation we’ve ever had, and that’s including the times you were on acid.”

“I’m not sure what to think of it either, honestly,” Loki mused.

“It’s very simple,” Tony sighed. “If I fuck up, and some mistake I make gets you hurt, Thor will probably knock me out. If something happens and you break my arm or something, accidents happen, Pepper gets first dibs to kick your ass. Not Rhodey. Capisce?”

“Oh, I see,” the trickster mused. “That _is_ a bit complicated, I suppose.”

“What if she’s not around?” the Colonel asked.

“You wait,” the inventor growled. “You really want to have to explain to her that you hurt him first before she got the chance? Or me, with situation reversed?”

Realization dawned. “Oh, _fuck_ no,” Rhodey said, suddenly serious.

“Exactly, boo-boo.”

“For the record, anyone who sends me to an early grave would have both of my children to answer to almost immediately,” Loki said.

“Wait, both?” Tony blinked. “But your jump 97 said-”

“Only one of them technically had a mother,” the trickster explained. “The other began as a construct, only with more organic base structure than yours.” He pointed ceiling-ward. “He was my daughter’s companion and guardian, at the start, and took the form of a wolf.”

“You... made a magic AI?” the inventor asked slowly.

“Of a sort. I made better than I knew, in constructing his capacity for learning and language. He became highly intelligent rather quickly, and soon outgrew his original purposes, becoming worth much more to Hel and I both. Some... well some on Asgard found his self-possessed intellect to be rather disturbing, and claimed he ought not be allowed to grow further. His nature, as a construct, allowed him to shape-shift and use magic at will, or even exist incorporeally. He was more of the astral plane than reality, as JARVIS exists more virtually than corporeally: his circuits are not necessarily him, though he is made up of them, whereas your body is very much you, because you live in it and it drives you as much as you drive it, to an extent.”

“I’m still getting ‘magic AI’ out of this, too,” Rhodey mused.

Tony waved off his words, focused on Loki.

A little amused by the inventor’s fascination, the god continued, “Fenrir did not have that limitation, given his body was whatever he wanted it to be and did not even require sustenance most of the time, unless he changed it to a form capable of consuming and digesting it. As he developed... he became very powerful, actually, especially once Hel reached adolescence and he did not feel needed by her, as much as he had. He had limits to his emotional awareness: he could feel pleasure and pain, he had developed a will of his own, which impressed me very greatly, and he could identify the emotions of others and react to them, but there was a lack of empathy. He could have become more than a god, in a way, and some in Asgard were absolutely terrified of his potential, and particularly that he might self-propagate eventually.”

“Oh my god. The wolf swallowing the sun is a metaphor for the singularity, but with a magic wolf,” Tony muttered. “That... I don’t even know what that is. Did they actually chain him up?”

“They wanted to. He did try to bite off Týr’s hand, but only really took a couple of fingers, and that was because he knew Gleipnir was trouble as soon at touched him, and started to violently revolt at their trying to bind him with it. It took me weeks for Hel and I to calm him down again to the point he would listen to reason,” Loki recollected, sounding deeply annoyed.

“Gleipnir?” Rhodey asked, confused.

“A fetter to bind him, after he had broken free of two more impressive-looking ones, on what had seemed to be casual bets. It was made by the dwarves, and looked more akin to a ribbon than a chain. Their plans for his containment to this day still sicken me to contemplate,” his eyes narrowed slightly.

“What options did you give him?” Tony asked, his voice quiet.

Loki met his gaze, finding something like empathy in them. He knew JARVIS had been threatened before. The man understood very keenly. “I told him that, for his own safety, if he wanted to grow further into whatever mystery he was becoming, I wanted to see, and help however I could, but that we could not both remain in Asgard. They did not understand his nature as I did, and while I was at heart afraid of what he might become, he still meant enough to me that I would not deny him that choice. His other options would be war with Asgard, which would have broken my heart, but I would fight with him if he required it.”

The trickster smiled a bit faintly, then. “I also told him there was another option, which might not truly protect him, but would make it illegal and morally reprehensible for any Aesir to treat him like a mere animal ever again; I offered to help him develop a soul, which would distance him from the astral plane, and require a more limited physical body to house, both of which I could also help him with, if that were what he truly wanted.”

“He chose that?” Tony asked.

Loki nodded. “It required a great deal of sacrifice, from us both, of power and blood and more, but I regret not a moment of it. There is no other word for it; he is simply my son. And I am his sole parent, however unconventionally.”

The Colonel shot the ceiling an odd look, and Tony a still stranger one. “Uh...”

“Don’t make this awkward, Rhodey,” Tony sighed.

“Mr. Liesmith?” the AI asked suddenly.

“Yes, JARVIS?”

“Should he ever visit the earth, would it be possible for me to meet Fenrir?”

The god of lies’ eyebrows raised slowly, and he shot the mad engineer a sidelong look, silently questioning.

Tony nodded fervently. _Yes. Yes. I need to see this happen. Yes._

“I will tell him of you, when I next have the chance. He may wish to meet you, as well,” Loki said, with considerable warmth in his voice.

Silently, the soldier held out his empty glass to Tony. “I am not drunk enough for this. Fix it.”

The inventor laughed a little, and picked up the fallen top of his metal shaker, and began mixing another drink. “Too emotionally complicated?”

Rhodey shot him a look. “You deserve each other, I think. That’s all I learned from this. Jesus Christ.”

Loki sniggered at that, and sipped slowly from his own drink.

“Why a wolf?” the soldier asked suddenly.

“Angrboða was from a community in Aflheim made up primarily of Jotunns who escaped the icing-over of their home world, and had a few generations to adjust. She was one-quarter fae, but still very much Jotunn, in her ways, and had a fondness for wolves. She had raised a pack of them, a breed from Jotunnheim that is now rare, and known for sometimes growing to be larger than horses.”

“Is this why you’re ridiculously huge in that form?”

“That’s the smaller indoor version,” Loki assured.

Tony looked moderately unnerved by this.

“Angrboða and I met in no small part because one of my own frequent-use forms, as a shape-shifter, is a wolf-shape, and she saw me use it, in a mock-duel with their village’s oldest mage, who I was studying under. She was a shape-shifter herself, and took wolf-shape to interrupt the match by tackling me to the ground, which she apparently considered more interesting than introducing herself first,” he mused, the memory clearly a pleasant one. “Hel was already living with a mother of wolves, and myself; it seemed only the natural shape for her guardian and companion to also take, though she did not meet Angrboða’s pack until she was older, during the years we spent with her in Alfheim. We wanted her to know both places as her own, if she wanted them, but fate and Mistress Death had other ideas.”

“What happened, exactly?” Rhodey asked. “He explained Mistress Death, but...”

“My daughter is Queen of Helheim, the land of the dead,” Loki explained. “When she came of age Mistress Death appeared to her, and the rest of us, as did one of the Norns. She was given a crown, and certain powers to aid her, and she has thrived, ever since, as a ruler of that place, despite her initial fears. Fenrir lives in her home, as her closest advisor, though generally he spends much of his time just doing as he pleases.”

“Oh. Cool. Also disturbing, but not actually as much as the corpse-up-the-sleeve thing,” the Colonel considered.

“You really tell the whole story, then,” Loki mused.

“I kinda did. It kinda took a while,” Tony admitted.

 

~~

 

After a few more press appearances over another week or two, the media spotlight was eventually distracted by other things, to Loki’s relief. He had fully taken over in Ben’s place as Pepper’s assistant, and did thus have more to occupy his time, after all. For example, he had proved just how convenient All-Speak is for any and all international business meetings, to the extreme annoyance of most translators other companies employed.

He and Pepper did also find they had good rapport meetings and guidance of projects throughout the company. Loki never undermined her directly, even if he might disagree with a set of tactics she used; he still only ever played along, let her lead, and then perhaps afterward discussed his concerns with her privately, usually in terms of asking questions, to make certain he understood her intentions. It was times like that, Pepper recalled she was dealing with a prince, who had to play that particular game of restraint all the time, with family like his own. With Pepper, he felt far more comfortable being open with his concerns, once they stepped outside of her court and back into the relative privacy of her office, so long as no one else was in there with them.

When the Avengers were called out of the country to deal with a band of Skrull smugglers attempting to lie low in Guatemala, the trickster feigned a complete lack of concern until Tony’s return a few days later, at which point expressions of frustration and affection on both sides between the two men caused permanent damage was done to a work bench in the inventor’s lab, making it outright unusable. Pepper, once she returned home to the tower that night, for her part, only did a bit of superficial damage to the headboard of their bed.

Loki and Tony destroyed half the lab, two weeks later, getting into a heated argument about timeline-maintenance in regards to Tony getting captured by Doom, when it seemed that their actions against Hydra might have accidentally moved that event closer, to within less than a year. After a week of both men seething, and Pepper giving them space, she chained them both to the bed and spent a night talking (and maybe a little bit of whipping) some sense into them. It was a very long night and a few tears might have wound up shed toward the end of it, from sheer emotional intensity.

All subsequent fights, they tended to try and work out sexually first, and then only escalate to physical violence if tensions reignited still hotter the next day.

 

~~

 

Somehow, months passed as they settled into each other’s lives. Loki made a few diplomatic trips to other worlds: not only within the Nine Realms, but also Titan and a few Kree outposts, causing them necessary trouble, for timeline-maintenance. The Avengers continued saving the world regularly. Pepper Potts was on the cover of Forbes again, and a few tabloids were suggesting she had tamed a god of chaos.

Her only public comment on that was, “I would never recommend anyone make the mistake of assuming he’s anything remotely like tame,” to one reporter.

Loki had become essential to her, and to the company, she didn’t add, but it was clear in the way other employees now spoke to him. They viewed him as a permanent sort of anchor, just as much as they did Pepper herself, and Tony Stark. And it wasn’t just people at work, either.

Even Happy and Rhodey cracked jokes with him, even, which had actually startled Tony when he witnessed it. It had surprised him even more when they openly invited him, as well as Pepper, out for drinks.

The bar didn’t even explode, when they did.

“The family has accepted you, then,” Pepper mused.

“Apparently so.” He smiled at her, soft and a little surprised himself by it.

That when Amora appeared. Loki noticed her first, sensing her arrival and finding her in the crowd before the shimmering gold smoke of her teleportation quite cleared. She wore the illusion of a floor-length green dress and topaz necklace, but Loki was fairly certain she was actually in armor. Even nervous as he was, he smiled brightly at her despite himself.

“Loki!” she greeted, seeing him inclined to welcome her and quickening her pace so that he had to step away from the bar, anticipating how she launched herself at him bodily, and catching her, proceeding to spin until she emitted a squeal.

Pepper stared, suddenly understanding why a few alternate versions of herself might have wanted to threaten this woman.

“Damn,” Tony said, staring a little.

“I’m having an uncomfortable and irrational pricking sort of feeling,” the CEO admitted quietly into her drink.

Stroking up and down her back comfortingly, he assured, “You remember the recordings.”

“I do. I said it was irrational,” she muttered, blushing a little.

Loki set the Enchantress down, smirking at her when she cuddled against his chest and wrinkled her nose up at him. “You’re really only wearing this ridiculous mortal clothing, aren’t you?”

“Yes, and the edges of your armor plating are a bit uncomfortable through this shirt, dear,” the trickster responded, gripping her upper arms and pulling her back from him a bit, even though it made her frown. “You’re the one wearing armor in a Midgardian bar, Amora. What brings you here?”

“I need distraction, Loki. Also I kind of want to stab you, but I’ve long ago come to terms with being over Thor, really.” She frowned. “Did you have to hand that girl an apple so easily? Really?”

“It was a very strange day, darling. I gave away all sorts of things, including the remains of my sanity. Speaking of which, you should meet the people I threw that to four winds for,” he gestured back toward the bar.

“Is one of them the red-haired woman currently glaring at me?” Amora asked.

Loki hesitated. “Yes. We’re involved.”

“She seems to have another man being very-”

“Him too. We all three are involved,” the trickster amended.

Amora’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh _really?_ ” She then suddenly frowned. “But I want to cause chaos in Midgard with you, my dearest friend. Please?”

Loki considered, looking sincerely thoughtful. “I may have some ideas. Possibly. Maybe here, maybe elsewhere. Let me plot, my dear, and I can provide you cathartic chaos. You know me to be capable and creative enough for your needs.” He kissed her forehead lightly. “Come along. I need to assure a couple of people of my loyalties before Pepper attempts to threaten your life.” He offered his arm.

She took it, only pouting a little. “If you insist.”

“I do. I value your life, my friend, and these are people who have successfully ensnared me far more than I anticipated, in a fairly short period of time, keep in mind,” he said gravely.

Eyeing them, Amora began to understand his concerns, and allowed him to abruptly drop her arm, sensing him throwing up a simple but effective attention-deterring field, with modifications suited to cause any recording devices aimed their way to fry. She reached out with a bit of her own magic to get a feel for those modifications, in case they might come in useful for herself later.

It also gave her an excuse to ignore Loki pressing close to the slightly irate redhead.

“I am not attracted to her,” he said, to start.

“I know that on a logical level. I just have also had bad experiences with, ah, similar women. In past relationships. I’m okay. I’m not going to kill anyone,” Pepper said. “I just-” She stopped when he kissed her, soft and slow, one of his hands at the side of her neck.”

“Uhm...” Tony looked around the room quickly.

“He put up an attention-deterring field that will also cause any recording devices aimed this way to lose power, or suffer a shattered lens,” Amora assured. “You all aren’t public then?”

“Have you _been_ around this planet much?” Tony asked. “All three of us are already assassination targets for insane villains. I don’t need religious groups added in. I’ve dealt with them enough, just with Avengers PR and Thor being sort of an alien god, and we all agreed that until earth’s culture grows up a bit more, we don’t need that sort of craziness going on for another few years, at least.”

Amora nodded. “Wise choice, I suppose. Not fair to you, of course.”

“Yeah, being in the public eye can be a bitch.” He shrugged.

Loki pulled back, and met Pepper’s gaze. “You have me. She only borrows me, and even so, I would never give her that. She and I have known each other for over a millennia, most of which she spent in love with Thor; no greater deterrent to my libido has yet been found than for someone to desire my brother. Rest assured. I’m not capable of wanting her, pretty as she may be. It is beyond me.”

Pepper giggled helplessly at that. “Okay,” she said. “Okay, I surrender, please stop talking.”

He stepped back, then, smiling a little. “Pepper Potts, meet Amora the Enchantress. Amora, this lovely woman is Pepper. Also, while I believe you both have met briefly in a few violent skirmishes involving Thor, I don’t think you’ve been properly introduced to Tony Stark, either. Tony, this is my dear friend Amora.”

She shook first Tony’s hand, given he was closer, and stepped forward to shake Pepper’s as well. “I’m charmed to meet you, and impressed that you have him already so well trained.”

Loki, who had just paused to taste Tony’s drink, audibly choked.

Tony almost collapsed in a fit of giggles.

“Amora, remind me again why we are friends?” Loki rasped, setting the drink on the bar as gently as he could manage, but he realized Pepper was laughing a little, helplessly behind one hand.

“I see how you two get along so well, suddenly,” the CEO said, looking between her taller lover and the Enchantress.

“We both do have a similar way with people,” Amora admitted. “They either like us, or cannot stand us, and either way consider us rather crazy.”

Loki lowered the spell around them with a gesture, his fingers briefly aglow. “They aren’t wrong.”

Still wheezing a little from laughter, Tony managed to drag himself upright.

Rhodey looked over, looking a bit confused, like he’d forgotten they were there for a moment. “What just happ––wow, who are you?” His eyebrows shot up as he abruptly noticed Amora.

She smiled sweetly at him, in a way that somehow made him think disconcertingly of knives and needles for reasons he couldn’t explain. “Hello.”

“Colonel James Rhodes, Mr. Hogan-”

“Call me Happy, Loki,” the man corrected, though he was also staring a little bit at Amora, with a wariness that had tended to creep into his expression at the sight of gorgeous women of a certain type, ever since he had seen Natasha Romanov’s handiwork in action, while they tried to find Vanko: like he suspected he should maybe be a little afraid. Natasha had that effect on people.

“- _Happy_ Hogan,” Loki corrected, “this is my very old friend Amora the Enchantress.”

Suddenly Happy looked like he felt vindicated, and also a little afraid. “Hello.”

“I don’t bite,” she assured sweetly. “Much.”

Rhodey stood up to shake her hand. “Nice to meet you, Miss.”

“You’re cute,” she mused.

“No,” Loki said. “Darling, you would break him.”

Rhodey shot him a look that was partially disapproving, but also a little genuinely curious and questioning.

The trickster’s expression remained very serious. He shook his head slowly.

“You’re not fun, suddenly, Loki dear,” Amora huffed. “I wouldn’t even use the _heavy_ chains. I know he’s mortal.”

Pepper’s eyes went a bit wide. So did Rhodey’s, and he gently released her hand and shot the trickster a grateful look and nod of approval.

“I didn’t mean physically, Amora dear. Though that’s also a serious consideration, I do know you’ve had mortal lovers survive before, but not this one, just trust me. How _is_ Skurge, by the by?” Loki asked, as though discussing the weather.

Tony sat down beside Pepper, as the two gods chatted. They exchanged glances. Rhodey finished off his current drink and ordered another quickly.

“My beloved Executioner is well, as always. Still well-behaved. He does love company, though, as I do. It’s been some while since we had anyone interesting new to play with. Perhaps it’s time,” she mused.

Tony bit his lip to keep from laughing at the expression that crossed Rhodey’s face, when he overheard that.

Happy patted the soldier’s shoulder, as though congratulating him on his escape.

“I’ve met some truly intriguing mages around Jotunnheim, actually,” Loki said. He then seemed to have a slightly disturbing thought, which then made him grin very unpleasantly. “I even found out I have a half-brother there.”

“It’s so cold there,” Amora sighed.

“You haven’t heard about my work on the thaw, then.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Your _what_?”

Loki began to explain some of what he had been up to.

Tony and Pepper sidled a couple seats over, to join Rhodey.

“Don’t say a word,” the soldier said instantly. “Not one.”

“There are no words, Rhodey honey, there just aren’t,” Tony sighed, barely resisting another fit of giggles. “Oh wow.”

“I feel very secure right now,” Pepper said. “There’s that.”

The inventor rested an arm around her shoulders. “Me too.”

She shot him a questioning look.

“She’s sort of gorgeous. I’m _not_ entirely immune to irrational ‘stop touching him’ sort of feelings. I just repress my reactions habitually. You know I do.” He shrugged.

“Why did I not notice her show up and sort of... forget you guys were in the room for a minute or two, there?” Rhodey asked.

“Loki put up a ‘nothing to see here’ sort of spell while he was assuring Pepper she has nothing to be jealous of, since she looked a little murderous,” Tony explained.

“Magic shit, man.”

“I know.” Tony patted his friend’s arm. “Trust me, I know.”

“I kind of like her, now, actually,” Pepper mused. “She’s not at all boring.”

“There is that,” the inventor mused.

 

~~

 

“What did you ever do to distract Amora from the Thor-getting-married thing?” Tony asked, about a month later, when she still hadn’t exploded anything around earth that anyone had noticed so far.

Pepper made a curious noise, too.

“She seems to be trying to seduce Býleistr.”

“Your... half-brother? The king one?” Pepper verified.

“I cannot tell if she has a thing for bringing royalty to their knees, or what, really,” Loki sighed. “At least he’s handling it far better than Thor.”

“Oh?”

“I had no idea he had any submissive tendencies, but according to Amora, neither did he until very recently.”

“I don’t want to know any more than that,” Tony said. “Ever.”

“That was exactly what I said,” Loki agreed, with feeling.

“You’ll just have to try very hard not to listen when I ask her about it next time she visits, then, because I’m too morbidly curious to give up a chance to enjoy girl-talk quite that crazy. That’s entertainment gold,” Pepper muttered.

“Sometimes you scare me a little, Pep,” Tony said.

“Good,” she responded, smiling prettily. “We’re even.”

He sighed. “Fair.”

Loki shook his head in amusement at them both.

 

~~

 

One night, when Loki returned from annoying far off-enemies a bit battered and bruised, to find her frustrated and sulking on the couch from a day at work that had particularly frustrated her, he did indeed take the form of a slightly over-sized wolf and laze on the couch with her, partly in her lap. To Pepper’s mild chagrin, it really was extremely comforting.

Then Tony had strolled in and emitted an embarrassing noise. “Oh my god, this is so adorable.”

“Shut up, Stark,” Loki-the-wolf rumbled. He glared when he heard a noise indicating the inventor had just snapped a picture of them with his phone. “ _Stark_.” His ears pressed back flat against his head.

“Pepper, I want you to know you are my favorite Disney princess,” Tony said.

She considered him, her expression a flat mask for a couple moments before she pointed Tony’s way and said lightly, “Sick him.”

Loki gave an amused snort, rolling off of her to the floor lightly, right before launching himself at the inventor, who emitted a horrified cry just before being tackled to the ground with some violence; although the wolf put one massive paw between the back of the inventor’s head and the floor when they hit the floor.

“Okay! I’m sorry! I’m-ACK!” He was scandalized when Loki-the-wolf began to lick his face, clearly just to irritate him. “Fuck you! Stoppit! Ack my eye! You licked my eye!”

Pepper was laughing hysterically from her place on the couch, wiping tears from the corner of her eyes. She laughed so hard she lost track of Tony’s bickering, and Loki’s retorts, until both men stood in front of her, Loki human again and smiling, Tony pouting only a little, his hair a complete mess from being licked into sticking up in improbable directions by a deranged shape-shifter. She stared back up at them, where she had wound up lying on her back and shaking with laughter. “Ridiculous. Both of you are just...” She waved a hand. “Utterly and totally ridiculous.”

“She think she’s noticed?” Tony asked lightly.

“Noticed what?”

“Oh right, you and calendars are worse than I am,” the inventor mused, beginning to grin. “I forget, sometimes. If I’m the only one who has noticed this, Pepper, you are so not allowed to make fun of me and my issues remembering dates ever again.”

“Wait, what?” Her brow furrowed in confusion.

“It’s been a year, Sweetie,” he chided.

Her eyes went wide. “No way.”

“It has.”

“How...” She sat up, staring between the two of them. “The six-month mark feels like it was yesterday, though!”

“I am confused,” Loki said, raising a hand.

Pepper stood up and kissed him. “Apparently, it’s our anniversary and somehow only Tony caught on, and I feel terrible.”  
The trickster’s eyes widened. “Oh.”

“I almost thought you were gonna miss it, bright-eyes,” Tony muttered. “How was space and the Kree?”

“Annoyed and annoying,” he responded, letting the inventor tug him a little closer and enjoying the brief welcome-home kiss.

The ‘home’ part still staggered him.

Pepper’s arms wrapped around his waist from behind, and Tony reached around him to stroke her hair with one hand, his other still on the trickster’s face.

“So hey,” Tony said. “Welcome back. Stick around another year, you think?”

“More than, if you’ll have me,” Loki responded softly.

“If you somehow think we don’t already have you,” Pepper murmured between his shoulder-blades, “I’m going to make you get ‘Property of Pepper Potts and Tony Stark’ tattooed on your hip, Loki.”

“I might not be averse,” he teased back, and chuckled at the thoughtful noise she made in response, her arms squeezing him a little tighter. “You have me. You know that,” he said, to both of them.

“Good,” Tony said. “Because you’ve got us whether you like it or not.”

“I like it very much.” The god pressed their foreheads together. “I love it.”

 

~~

 

Late that night, his lovers both abed and deeply asleep, Loki stepped out onto the balcony, a memory stick in his hands. It was one he hadn’t shared yet. It showed a future they hadn’t gotten to yet.

For the first time since meeting the Traveler, Loki felt like he could really have it, so long as he kept these two in his life, which he also knew himself capable of.

“One-hundred and seventy-four,” he said, staring skyward. “You were on time enough for us, old friend, old stranger. Thank you.”

He traced a sigil for memory and hope on on the door before he walked back in, and left the memory stick on Pepper’s night-stand, before rejoining his lovers under the sheets. Falling asleep quickly, he dreamed of his Hel, and she of him. He asked her if she could pass on that message, to tell the Traveler he had been on time.

“Rest easy, father. He knows.”

“And that I plan to keep them?”

“I’m certain he assumes as much.” She laughed at him a little. “I haven’t seen you look so well in centuries, you know.”

“I’m not surprised.”

“You know what they are already calling you and your lovers, in Nifelheim?” she asked.

“No.”

“The Three of Asgard and Midgard.”

His breath caught, and his eyes opened very wide. “You’re serious?”

Hel nodded, and then settled against his side again, head resting on his shoulder. “You’re one of his most successful jumps, I think, in the end. Or you will be, when the time comes to really prove it.”

“We are?”

She nodded, her smirk a little knowing.

“What have you foreseen?” he asked, familiar with that look on her.

“I’ll not tell you,” she teased. “Not even a hint, for you would catch on too quickly.”

He prodded her side, where he knew her to be ticklish, but she only twitched and pushed his hand away. “Why not tell me?”

“You need to be unaware, for it to work out properly, if you must know.”

“But this is... a good thing?”

Hel nodded. “Many good things.”

The trickster sighed heavily in relief. “I still worry, that they will come to their senses and cease finding me so amusing, or cease trusting me. There are events on the maps I’ve had to conceal from them.”

“And others I’ve dropped by and surreptitiously removed,” Hel admitted.

Loki’s hand settled on her throat briefly. “Daughter mine, please assure me that I can trust you. I need reminding.”

She sighed. “I swear to you, it is for no harmful intent,” she promised. “You simply... there are things you cannot know ahead, for certain reasons. The Norns still whisper your name, Lie-smith, weaving you into the fate of all things, along with myself. I do as I must, given what I am, and I love you, and tell you the truth only, when I say this will not harm you more than you and yours can withstand, I am certain.”

“But it may harm?”

“It will, but the intent is to further some many things worth that pain, father.”

His hand moved away from her neck to go back to stroking through her hair. “I thank you.”

“You act as though you could ever harm me,” she sighed. “It’s adorable.”

He shook his head. “You do the same. I used no dagger.”

“You knew I wouldn’t do too much lasting damage.”

“And you know what lengths I would go to spare you any pain I could,” Loki responded. “You know what you mean to me, you and Fenrir both.”

“He misses you. You should visit, soon,” she chided. “Bring your loves. He wants to know more about your Tony’s JARVIS, ever since you told us about him.”

“Yes. I have told JARVIS about him, and discussed at length his... possible options, since then,” the trickster murmured. “He would not be averse to meeting Fenrir. We have the time, for some while, should he wish to visit.”

“Should I tell him?” Hel asked.

“Give me a week to prepare them.”

The queen chuckled. “You have your week.”

He kissed her forehead. “My thanks.”

“They will try with as much fierce determination to keep you as you would to keep them, you know,” she told him. “I have met another Tony Stark, passing through.”

Loki’s breath caught.

“He was from one universe the Traveler could not save. He asked after you, as I know you, and he found me familiar, but still a little foreign. Our universe was not a fit for his mission. I know not what the differences were. He moved on, elsewhere.”

The trickster took a few slow, deep breaths.

“Are you alright, father?”

“I am. I am.” He rested his chin atop her head. “Thank you, for telling me.”

“Did you think your Traveler alone?”

“I know that _he_ did,” Loki murmured. “And he had far more experience than I.”

“I would meet your Tony Stark, and Pepper,” Hel said. “I want to know those who have healed you so, and love you so well, father.”

“I will bring them,” he promised. “I will.”

“Fenrir asked me, once, if you would do for us what your Traveler did for them,” his daughter said softly. “I asked him whether he thought that you hadn’t done it for us too, and he realized you had. Your Traveler did what he did for all of your family.”

“He did,” Loki confirmed. “He lost you, too, to the same virus that took his own life in the end. He showed me that too, along with... along with the rest.” He swallowed thickly. “He stayed with you, until you both were gone.”

“You sacrifice more for your children than most ever would sacrifice in their whole lives,” Hel said softly. “We love you whether you do that or not, do you know that?”

“I do,” he said. “I do.”

“Then why?” Hel asked, her voice very small.

“Because you are mine, and I value you far more than merely myself,” he said. “I would tear whole worlds apart for you, or slowly and painstakingly knit them back together, or both. I value myself, but you have within you the best parts of me, and far fewer of the parts of myself I loathe; how could I not value you above myself?”

His daughter hid her face against his shoulder for a moment. “I am worse than you, sometimes,” she said softly.

“I love those parts of you, too,” Loki responded.

“Why?” Hel insisted.

“Because they are not ‘worse’ to me. They are better.”

“How?”

“Because they are yours, and I love you helplessly,” he whispered.

Hel swallowed tightly, with a helpless smile. “I love you too, father,” she said, and resisted the urge to tell him that she looked forward to younger siblings who did not yet exist: twin forces of nature full of wit and strength and fierce love.

She did not say a word about it, or how the Norns were already whispering their names too, louder even than her own, or Loki’s.

Hel’s father kissed her forehead, and the dream faded.

 

~~

 

Pepper watched the last projection, when she woke just before dawn.

By the time it finished, the first weak gold rays of sunlight touched the coffee table, the projector, the couch, and Pepper herself. She had a hand over her mouth, and remained very quiet and still for a long time.

She didn’t hear Loki approach, but saw him out of the corner of her eye when he leaned forward with his arms folded on the back of the couch, looking at her expression.

“Thank you for not showing me that earlier,” she said quietly.

“And now?” he asked.

She looked at him, swallowing tightly. “Is that... did we change too many things?”

“I no longer know. The... data relevant to their early lives, in the drives, has vanished. I don’t know when, exactly, because they were there, at first, but I cannot remember where, and now I cannot find them.” He frowned. “I could not work out why, but I walked in my dreams to Helheim, and I think it was interference I could not have foreseen. I do not think this would be something we are allowed to plan, exactly.”

“Whose interference?”

“Those who maintain future history: the ones who remember past, present and future as all one. The Norns are among them, but there are others like them. Humans call them fates, but they aren’t truly the weavers. They exist differently than we do, is all. They seem to move through our world, but in reality they are the same at all points in time, and they find expressing themselves in terms we can understand... tricky, at best.” He cleared his throat. “Whether or not we can expect what you’ve now seen.” He nodded at the memory stick. “It’s not for us to know. Knowing the certainties of when, and how, would change things. We could choose not to do them, or try and fail because we misunderstood some aspect of it based on what we interpreted wrongly as prior instruction. So... we won’t know.”

“Unless... well unless.”

He nodded, and looked her in the eye. “Should we show him?”

“They both looked like all of us. That shouldn’t be possible.”

“Magic, and twins when magic is already a factor, both complicate heredity somewhat,” Loki murmured. “For reasons no one is certain of, even children of different fathers, if they are twins, both inherit magic even if only one father had that gift to give, in the first place. It is... also not unheard of for other traits to be altered or shared inexplicably as well.”

“Magic is always complicated. We are always complicated. It does make a little sense, there,” she muttered.

Loki stepped around the couch and sat beside her. “I knew you needed to know when I realized I could not longer even pretend to have the ability to predict... anything, about this, anymore.”

“We... should show him.”

The trickster took a deep breath.

“If or when. It.” She looked at him. “It’ll scare him now, but if...”

“That’s fairly brilliant, actually,” Loki murmured. “He’ll be a little angry.”

“He might thank us. I thanked you,” she pointed out.

“True. I must, as always, recall we are insane and unpredictable.”

She laughed a little, still sounding a little lost.

A long silence followed.

“Hel wants to meet you both. As does Fenrir, who also would like to visit, within a week’s time, to meet JARVIS,” Loki said suddenly, to break it.

“I’d like that. All of what you just said. We should do that.”

The trickster smiled a little.

“Hide that thing before he wakes up, please.”

Loki snapped his fingers, and the memory stick vanished, along with the projector: the former about his person in one of his usual pocket-dimensions, the latter back to the cabinet it usually resided in.

Tony did wake up not long after, and found both of them dozing on the couch, leaned together and looking a little sleep-rumpled and adorable. The inventor smiled at them a little and shook his head, making three cups of coffee: Loki’s with clove and a bit of dark coca, Pepper’s with cinnamon, his own black.

He had settled in next to Pepper very quietly, managing not to wake them; although halfway through his own cup, a thought occurred to him.

“What were you two up to out here?” he asked suddenly.

They both snapped awake, slightly dazed.

“Wha?” Pepper rubbed her eyes, then noticed coffee, and murmured a thanks, reaching out for it.

Loki groaned, blinking a bit. “Did you ask a question?”

“Yeah. You two fell asleep out here, but were both in bed when I woke up at about 2am for a bit. So... I asked what you two were up to.” He took a slow sip of his drink, smirking a little.

“We were staring out of the window in a moderate daze in the face of something I discovered recently, in the timeline data,” Loki said simply.

Pepper shot him a look.

He raised his eyebrows.

She thought about it, and realized he would probably notice himself anyway if it occurred to him to look, so they might as well. She shrugged.

Tony looked between them both nervously. “What did you find?

“Highly specific data loss. It’s now impossible for us to find the... specifics of time and location wherein...” Loki gestured vaguely.

“Kids,” Pepper said. “The ones Traveler showed him.”

“Information about them, mention of them being in particular places and times near the Cancer-verse events, are still present, but their ages aren’t specified. Based on other context clues in the data, they are older than two, younger than five, in the timelines most similar to ours.”

“But it’s officially all guessing from here forward,” Pepper said quietly.

Tony himself was staring into the distance now. “Holy shit.”

The CEO sighed into her coffee. “I know, right?”

Loki reached for his own cup and took a few large swallows.

Silence reigned again, for a while.

“So we have no clue... when... it could be...”

“Don’t over-think it. Nothing is certain,” Loki assured. “This may not happen at all, for us. You know that.”

“Or it could literally happen tomorrow,” the inventor pointed out.

“Would that be a problem?” the trickster inquired, his tone careful.

Tony took a deep breath, and let it out. “I might have a panic attack or two, but after that, I could handle it, yeah. You two?” He found them both staring back at him in slight shock. “What? I’ve had a year to get used to the idea, and some long existential talks with JARVIS, who is sort of... already... Look, I’m terrified, but that hasn’t stopped me from dealing with a lot of things, so yeah. I’m okay, actually.”

“Okay,” Pepper said. “I’m scared, too.”

“We all are, then,” Loki murmured. “I can say, from experience, that fear is survivable. It is better to be afraid of being incorrect, than convinced of things that are false about one’s children, I’ve found.”

“My god, I’m already dating two single parents,” the CEO deadpanned.

“I wasn’t single when I raised them,” Loki said, then hesitated. “Well I was during most of raising Fenrir as he developed into a true sentient being with his own will, yes, but he technically... no, never mind. That does not actually help my argument at all.” He sighed. “You win.”

Pepper giggled at him a little. “So what’s more frightening to us: the pending apocalypse, or potential imminent parenthood?”

“Our apocalypse came with an instruction manual,” Tony pointed out flatly.

“The latter being inclined to occur before the former,” Loki said quietly.

All of them winced at that thought.

“No pressure,” Tony sighed.

“All of the pressure,” Pepper groaned.

The inventor chewed his lip for a moment, then asked, “So... you think we’re ready for this?”

“Yes,” Loki said, low and sure.

“Yeah,” Pepper agreed. “Yeah we are.” They both turned and looked at him, with small and determined smiles.

“Yeah,” Tony echoed. “And there’s no fucking way anyone’s ready for us”

They both agreed, as dawn turned to day, casting the moment in shades of gold where the sun flooded in through the windows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... And now my health has returned, I should finally be able to continue _Catch and Release_ instead of proofreading a secondary epic that accidentally happened between C &R chapters one weekend.


End file.
